Sinking Into Sweet Uncertainty
by phoenixdown7
Summary: NarutoHP xover SasuNaru. When Sasuke comes back to Konoha, Naruto doesn't know quite how to take it. What's worse, Naruto has to go on a mission with the newly reunified team 7 and it doesn't go very well.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter™ or Naruto™. The series belong to JK Rowling and Masashi Kishimoto respectively.

AN: This is an attempt at a serious (and plausible) crossover between Harry Potter and Naruto. This will be SasuNaru along with other pairings that are most likely het. You have been warned.

Let's just say that this fic begins after ch. 307 and then will no longer follow the manga. Unless, of course, the plot still fits in my back plot. It probably won't. So, there you have it.

I don't know which Harry Potter book I'll set this during…probably the 6th because of their ages…but it won't necessarily follow the story line of the 6th or maybe it will. shrugs

Enjoy.

Sinking Into Sweet Uncertainty

Prologue

The sounds of rushing water and the shrill chirps of birds under toned by the monotonous cicada mating call of late summer entered Naruto's sensitive ears as a light breeze brushed through his golden bangs, which were hindered only by his tight forehead protector. For once in his life, Naruto was the first to the familiar bridge where so many of Team 7's missions had started and, for once in his life, Naruto didn't want to be there at all.

He felt unusually tense and his back tingled uncomfortably where it rested against the warm wooden railing of the bridge in his failed attempt to make his posture look laid back. He sighed slightly, slumping against the railing which was awkwardly shorter than he remembered it being. Of course, the last time he had stood on this bridge, he had been twelve years old – naïve, energetic, and short.

Naruto looked across the bridge, his gaze following the familiar stream until it made a turn past some trees and disappeared from view. He almost couldn't believe that had only been four years ago. It felt like a lifetime had passed – and maybe, in a sense, one had. He had managed to gain friendship in a world he had only known as cold and indifferent, only to have one of his most important friends betray him. The loss had shaken him to the core. To be a lonely orphan who was despised by most everyone around him was one thing, but to suddenly gain friends who had trusted him with their lives – or at least acknowledged him – and to have one of the most important ones turn his back on him and walk away as though their supposed bond never really mattered; that was something entirely different.

He had changed because of it, he realized that now. He had spent two whole years training just to get that person back and in the process, he had become a little less naïve, a little less optimistic, and just a little bit more cynical than he would have liked. And now, now that he had fulfilled his promise to Sakura-chan and to him self, he didn't know what to do or how to act.

His most important person was finally back and, like Naruto, he was different. When Naruto and Sakura found him again, Sasuke did some things that were…some things that made Naruto uncomfortable and confused. Naruto felt his face heat up at the recent memories, the only memories Naruto had of his best friend since they had separated four years ago – and the events that lead Sasuke back to Konoha. Naruto should have been happy, in fact, he should have been overjoyed to the point of giving into his endless pool of energy and jumping around the whole of Konoha, annoying everyone with his old childhood antics – but he wasn't happy. In fact, he was only unsettled and unsure, and that made him nervous, because today he wouldn't be able to avoid the issue anymore. Sasuke, the boy who – despite all of their differences – he thought he knew like the back of his hand, was now an unknown quantity.

It had been a month since they had gotten back, Sasuke in tow, and a week since Tsunade-baachan had decided Sasuke was no longer a danger to the village and fit to carry on with missions again. In that whole month, Naruto had only seen Sasuke once – the day they had gotten back – since then he had been avoiding the boy like the plague. Given the circumstances of the Godaime's decision, he couldn't do that anymore. Today, Team 7 was going to be whole again and they would be given their first mission in years.

Naruto bit his lower lip and frowned, his heart beating rapidly against the cage of his ribs in growing anticipation and anxiety. He stayed unnaturally slouched against the railings for long minutes until he began to hope that maybe, just maybe, the meeting had been cancelled when a familiar chakra signature grated against his senses and shot his newly positive thoughts down in one fell swoop.

Naruto frowned and gripped the wood behind him unconsciously as the dark-haired teen with the imposing chakra signature made his approach. Sasuke took measured steps, calculating and methodical like everything he did, that much hadn't changed. Naruto's uneasiness grew and he watched the boy warily. Sasuke's expression, however, was blank and unreadable.

Naruto hated the way Sasuke could hide his emotions behind that impenetrable mask of his, if in fact he had any emotions at all anymore. Naruto was sure that, although it was hard to admit it even to him self, his growing discomfort was practically written across his face. Naruto was only good at masking one type of emotion with equal proficiency, and that was sadness. After all, he constantly hid himself behind a smile.

Sasuke finally stopped, his black eyes boring into Naruto's indifferently until he turned and leaned against the same railing just feet away. Naruto's frown grew, but Sasuke remained still and emotionless on the surface, the wind playing with his hair and ruffling the obscenely open yukata shirt he had adopted during his time with that snake-bastard, Orochimaru.

Unexpectedly in his tense state, Naruto found himself wondering how Sasuke managed to protect himself with his pale chest so exposed; although, if he really thought about it, a thin blue-black cloth was barely an effective form of protective gear either.

Naruto realized a little late that he was staring, but he managed to turn his head away before Sasuke caught him in the act. Inexplicably, Naruto's face heated up again in embarrassment. He had no idea why he did it, but he wished he would stop blushing like a love-struck kunoichi whenever he encountered the tall dark-haired boy since returning to Konoha. It must have been due to that _incident_, Naruto decided as he forced his blush down, it was all because Sasuke…did that _thing _back at Orochimaru's.

Naruto shook his head, forcing the disturbing memories out of his mind before another unbecoming blush colored his cheeks. Once again Naruto felt nervous and Sasuke seemed completely impervious to the tension that was building between them as they waited for the rest of the team in pure, unadulterated silence.

That _bastard_.

It felt like hours before another chakra signature tingled in the periphery of Naruto's senses, followed by the appearance of Sakura who made her way onto the bridge from the same direction Sasuke had come.

Naruto felt a slight relief wash over him at the sight. She had a smile on her face as she spotted the two of them, and Naruto returned the smile, waving at her enthusiastically and grateful that someone else had finally come to break the unbearable silence. "Heya, Sakura-chan!"

"Hey Naruto, Sasuke-kun." She nodded at both of them, tucking a pink lock of hair behind one ear before positioning herself between them, a content smile on her face.

Sasuke just glanced in her direction, nodding almost imperceptibly. Sakura's smile grew exponentially, as though it was a great treat for Sasuke to even look in her direction.

Naruto could tell she was happy that Sasuke was back, which made him feel better about the situation. After all, he had wanted her to be happy and it had broken his heart to see her so devastated after Sasuke had left. At least one person in the team seemed glad to be reunited. Naruto let a smile tug at the corners of his mouth.

Now that she was there, Naruto could better ignore Sasuke's dark presence and the nauseous coil that had twisted in his gut during their wait together. His smile grew into something devious and his eyes narrowed as he looked at her. It'd been a long time since he had had the opportunity to bother her, after all.

"Ne, ne, Sakura-chan?"

Sakura's content smile dropped a bit as she turned to him. Her eyes narrowed, but for different reasons. Her tone was suspicious when she replied. "What?"

Naruto raised an eyebrow in what he thought was his 'cool' expression and he grinned 'suavely' at her – which actually came out looking a bit like a forced smirk. "Do you wanna…?"

"No," Sakura interrupted as she shook her head, clearly reading between the lines for her self and realizing where he was going with the stupid act.

Naruto frowned. "But…"

"For the last time, I said no, Naruto!" Sakura exclaimed, before looking away and crossing her arms over her chest as though indicating through body language that her statement was final and irrevocable.

Naruto smiled on the inside and mentally rubbed his hands together, but made sure that his expression was still one of extreme devastation.

"Okay then." He made sure his voice was a bit shaky. _Now, in for the kill_. "I just thought you'd want to spar with me, but if you're so against it…"

Sakura's head swiveled back and her green eyes widened at him. "S-spar with you?"

Naruto tried his best to still look innocently curious, but on the inside he was laughing. "Yeah…what did you think I was asking?"

"I thought…never mind." Sakura looked shocked and did he see a bit of disappointment flash across those emerald eyes? But she made a pretty fast recovery and smiled at him brightly.

"Of course I'd like to spar with you." Then her expression turned serious and Naruto could feel her tightly controlled chakra chafe against his own in her own bid for intimidation. "But, remember Naruto, I'm a lot stronger now and I _will_ pound you into the ground."

Naruto smirked at her, much in the way Sasuke used to smirk at him in that irritatingly arrogant way. "I doubt that, Sakura-_chan_."

It was odd how his and Sakura's relationship had evolved since Sasuke had left, but eventually, without either of them really noticing, they had become somewhat rivals. Naruto had seen, and on some unfortunate occasions felt, her newfound strength, and they had taken to sparring whenever they both had free time. That is, before Sasuke came back into their lives to fill the void they had attempted to fill on their own.

Sakura smirked back at him easily, flicking her lengthening hair behind her shoulders casually in an act she would have never been able to pull off as the weak kunoichi she used to be. She flicked a finger against the wooden railing Naruto was leaning against and part of it crumbled away so that he had to jump back into the middle of the bridge instead of falling into the stream below.

Her smirk grew into a smile. "Don't get too cocky yet, Naruto-_kun_."

Naruto almost laughed, adrenaline entering his veins from almost losing his foothold on the bridge, but the laughter and the good feeling that came with it died in his throat when he noticed Sasuke watching him with an expression other than blank indifference.

Sasuke's eyes were a bit wider than usual as though he was surprised, but he also looked…Naruto couldn't really describe it in words. All he knew was that the expression made him feel…guilty and ashamed. Although, what right Sasuke thought he had to make him feel that way was another question.

Naruto frowned as he stood trapped in Sasuke's uncharacteristically melancholy gaze. _Sasuke _didn't have any right to make him feel ashamed when _he _was the one who went away – _he _was the one who left without so much as a goodbye, and later, had even tried to kill his supposed best friend. It wasn't _Naruto's_ fault that things had continued on without Sasuke. It wasn't _Sakura's_ fault that she had had to move on. And it certainly wasn't _their_ fault that they had had to look to each other for support when their team was broken down the middle and Sasuke wasn't there to hold it together anymore.

Naruto's fists clenched and he glared at Sasuke with all the intensity of the pain he had felt since the day Sasuke had left until now. All of the discomfort and anxiety of that morning just washed away and bled into the hurt and anger he had always held back when it came to the dark-haired boy in front of him. Sasuke reacted by closing himself off once again, looking back at Naruto in a way that was worse than anger; it was just cold indifference.

"Naruto…"

Naruto relaxed a bit when Sakura placed a hand on his shoulder. She had been watching the entire exchange, but Naruto hadn't remembered her presence until now. Sasuke always had that effect on him. He always had that uncanny ability to shrink Naruto's world down to just two people.

Naruto ripped his gaze from Sasuke to see Sakura watching the pale boy worriedly as her comforting hand held Naruto back.

_So, that was how it was_, Naruto thought with no loss of bitterness.

Sakura was never really worried about him. Her first priority had always been Sasuke, even when the bastard had betrayed her and gone out of the picture. Naruto tried to smile, but it was strained. Sasuke didn't know how lucky he was, he really didn't. He really had no need to worry about losing her…no matter what he did.

Sasuke looked away and ignored the both of them as he stood by the side of the bridge like an arrogant statue.

Naruto sent him a frustrated glare for good measure, before huffing and sliding out of Sakura's loose grasp to go stand against the railing on the other side of the bridge.

Maybe, secretly, deep within him, the worst of his sore feelings were due to his disappointment that having Sasuke back didn't really make anything better. In fact, his presence only made things worse. It only made Naruto realize with a new and painful clarity that he would never really be able to bring Sasuke back, because the old Sasuke was gone. He could never bring back the days they had lost and he could never erase the past four years of hurt and loneliness from his memory. That was impossible. It was hard to think that maybe the last four years of struggling to bring back his best friend and eternal rival had been a lie and a waste of time. Everything that had kept him going most likely would never come true. He had never felt this pessimistic in his life.

He pouted and glared over at Sasuke who was still ignoring him, which made him even angrier. Plus, it was getting late. Where the _hell_ was Kakashi-sensei anyway!

And, of course, because Kakashi always managed to have the best timing without actually being _on _time, a soft 'poof' sounded to Naruto's right and Kakashi materialized in the middle of the bridge – his masked nose snuggly buried in the pages of his porn.

It was times like this when Naruto wondered why Kakashi even wore a mask – all he had to do was read that book, like he always did, and no one would ever be able to see his face. Although, what there could possibly be to hide behind that mask always inspired Naruto's most creative speculations and used to even push the younger – but no less affected by the stick up his butt – Sasuke to a state of cat-like curiosity.

"Yo." Kakashi put up his hand in his usual lazy gesture of greeting, which suddenly made it seem as though four years without this routine hadn't passed at all…almost.

Sakura immediately bounded in front of Kakashi, the tradition clearly not lost on her either, and gesticulated at him angrily. "You're _so_ late!"

"Well, you see I…" Kakashi's familiar parody of a good excuse floundered as he looked over at Naruto, who hadn't joined Sakura in the usual sensei-bashing he used to be so enthusiastic about.

Naruto could feel Kakashi's one available eye rove over him and possibly through him questioningly. Naruto just frowned over at Kakashi with his arms crossed, making him look to all others present, more like Sasuke than he would care to know.

Kakashi frowned beneath his mask. Naruto knew this because the man's eye crinkled down in that certain way that denoted his thought process was between slight confusion and full comprehension – in short, he was analyzing him.

He almost looked like he would ask Naruto something in a serious tone that would maybe even start off a whole line of questioning much like those of a psychiatrist looking to properly evaluate and cure one of his more difficult patients, but of course, this was Kakashi-sensei and nothing out of his mouth was ever truly serious.

"Have you been eating enough fiber, Naruto-kun? You look a bit constipated."

Sakura immediately flung a hand to her mouth with which she used to push back a poorly hidden fit of raucous laughter, while Sasuke just looked at Kakashi as though the Jounin had grown another head – but Naruto was boiling with rage and embarrassment, much like a child who had just been made fun of by someone he respected, which really wasn't that far from the case in all actuality.

"I AM NOT CONSTIPATED!"

"Really?" Kakashi looked down at him concernedly, as though he didn't really believe him, but the teacher couldn't quite hide the way his one visible eye crinkled up in glee. He had brought Naruto, however unknowingly, out of his unnaturally morose funk, after all.

"BELIEVE IT!" (1)

"Maa, maa…I get it. Settle down, settle down." Kakashi placated him, waving his hand in the universal gesture of enforced calm.

Naruto stopped shaking his fists into the air and jumping around, settling down to realize that Kakashi had brought him out of his uncharacteristic depression without him even noticing it. Naruto looked up at the masked jounin with a new mix of admiration and irritation and did his best to ignore Sasuke as the boy walked closer to hear the details of their first mission as a newly reunified team.

"Well, now that that's out of the way," Kakashi murmured, smiling down at them all like a cat who got the canary. "The new mission is to go into the borders of the hidden village of Sound and investigate a recently abandoned building Orochimaru supposedly used as one of his laboratories."

Kakashi smiled down at them all again in that uncanny way through the shape of his visible eye, as though he had just announced that everyday would be their birthday and Naruto's first present would be a year's supply of ramen. As it was, however, Naruto and his team mates were not nearly as pleased as all that.

"_What!_" Naruto's high-pitch, whiney-mode voice broke into the ensuing silence as he glared in disbelief at his team leader – proving that Naruto really hadn't changed all that much since his childhood. "That's not even a D-ranked mission!"

"Yeah, Kakashi-sensei," Sakura added, looking almost as incensed as Naruto as she quivered beside him. "Are you sure this mission was assigned to us? I mean, we may not be Jounin or even Chuunin in official rank yet, but we all know that our abilities are just as good. Shouldn't we be getting a higher class mission, like guard-duty for an important noble or the like?"

"Well," Kakashi replied, seemingly unfazed by Naruto's outburst and Sakura's incessant questions. "This mission isn't actually as poorly ranked as you think. In fact, I heard that the old lab may be haunted."

"Liar!" Both of them yelled at him in unison, fists clenched in all-out fury that the Godaime would think so little of them.

But then, Sakura's fists fell to her sides and she placed a hand against her chin as though thinking. She looked over at Sasuke who was looking off into the distance passed Kakashi's left shoulder in a clear signal that he was bored. Naruto stopped waving his fists around when he realized he no longer had back-up and looked over at Sakura before following her intent gaze to Sasuke in confusion.

"What is it, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked, which seemed to pull Sakura out of her own head and bring her back to the real world.

A breeze blew across the bridge in the dramatic silence, whipping through their hair and sending leaves from the trees into the air. Everyone was looking intently at Sakura, even Sasuke, who had finally noticed her eyes on him.

Sakura shrugged and then turned her attention to Kakashi. "Well," she began, her voice strangely clear now that all the wind had died down. "This is all because of Sasuke-kun, isn't it?"

Kakashi's smile vanished and he finally closed the book in front of his face with a soft clap. This time, he was serious. "Of course, Sakura. After all, this is his test, right Sasuke-kun?"

Sasuke murmured a nearly indistinguishable, "Hn."

The group went silent and Sasuke looked away, reminding Naruto of all his previous discomfort before the arrival of Kakashi.

That was right. This wasn't meant to be a normal mission with Team 7. It couldn't be with Sasuke's only recently revoked status as an S-Class criminal to the hidden village of the Leaf. Tsunade-baachan needed to confirm Sasuke's reliability. Trust needed to be rebuilt between Sasuke and the powers that be, and between Sasuke and his own team mates.

Naruto wondered whether that could ever truly be the case again – after all the Uchiha genius, beloved pride of the village, had done to separate himself and attack that trust that had been so carefully built between him and his comrades.

Naruto looked over at Sasuke as the brooding teen watched the stream below the bridge dispassionately. Naruto's expression saddened. Sasuke just wasn't the same person any more. Naruto wondered if he had ever really known who Sasuke really was, would he have still respected him as much? Would he still have wanted to be the boy's _friend_? It all seemed like important issues from a lifetime ago.

"Naruto!"

Naruto started at Sakura's voice ringing in his ears, and he realized that his team mates were already passed the other side of the bridge and Sakura was waving at him to follow.

Naruto shook his head from his downward thoughts and raced after them as Kakashi and Sasuke failed to wait for him. Sakura just smiled at him when he reached her position, before jumping off after the two impatient sharingan users.

Naruto could already tell, with a beginning like this, today was going to be very long. At this point, however, he couldn't really know how painfully true that observation was.

………………………………………………………………

The large black doors creaked open, releasing a blast of dust from the inside of the building, before Kakashi made his way in followed closely by Naruto, Sakura, and then Sasuke.

The inside was almost pitch-black until Kakashi pulled out a flare and lit it against a wall. Suddenly the inside was revealed to be one big cavernous octagonal room with doors in each wall. Naruto peered upward, squinting, until he saw that the entire ceiling was vaulted stone with a strange mural painted across it.

"That looks like a skeleton…with some type of snake coming out of its mouth," Sakura stated beside him as she also peered upwards.

"Creepy," Naruto added, noting the strange way the painting glowed green in the flickering light of Kakashi's flare.

"Always the observant one, aren't you, Sakura?" Kakashi asked, setting his torch higher so that he could get a better look. "I've never seen a design quite like this before, and I've been in a number of Orochimaru's abandoned labs. Have you, Sasuke?"

Sasuke turned his head from where he was looking at a stack of books nestled in a large book case against the far wall. He turned his dark eyes toward the mural and then glanced back at Kakashi. "No, I've never seen that before."

"Hm," Kakashi mused almost to himself. "That doesn't look like his style either. Strange."

For some reason, Naruto felt a chill trail down his spine as he continued to observe the painting. He looked away and the feeling dissipated. He really didn't like this place. Maybe it _was _haunted. Could Kakashi have been telling the truth?

Naruto mentally shook his head. _Of course not!_ Ghosts didn't exist, after all. Everyone knew that. But Naruto couldn't keep the growing sense of unease from creating an uncomfortable weight in his gut. This place was already worse than Orochimaru's head quarters where they were able to find Sasuke. He already couldn't wait for this mission to be over and done with.

Sakura seemed to agree full heartedly, because she was rubbing her arms as though there was a cold draft when none existed and her eyes were unnaturally wide as though trying to see something that wasn't there.

"Over here!"

Naruto and Sakura pulled themselves together and followed Kakashi and Sasuke through a door which lead into a small, cramped tunnel that was almost too small for Kakashi's build. There was no source of light in the tunnel except for Kakashi's flare, which flickered dangerously in some sort of unknown draft and cast each of their lengthened shadows against the packed mud walls.

Naruto suppressed a shudder at the overall creepiness of his surroundings, but eventually, they all made it out the other end into an even larger room than the first.

Here, Kakashi managed to find a large light switch and a giant chandelier lit up from its hanging position in the middle of the ceiling.

Naruto looked around at the room, wide eyed. He had never seen so much _stuff_ packed into one room before. Each wall was packed with books in tall book shelves with some scrolls stacked up below the shelves in small piles. In front of the book shelves were small display cases, each holding a unique object of the likes Naruto had never seen before.

Sakura had already moved to peer above one particular display case, holding something that looked like a floating brain with tentacles. Her emerald eyes were wide as the glowing water in the display reflected an eerie aquamarine light across her features. "Are you sure this place is abandoned?"

"Good question," Kakashi murmured, walking over to another display case containing what looked to be a decaying, severed hand, before moving on to inspect what seemed to be a magnifying glass with dark indistinct figures looming within its reflection.

Sasuke had already pulled a few scrolls out and unrolled them before peering at them studiously.

But Naruto's eyes had locked upon something sparkling and floating above a table in the center of the room. As he approached it, he realized it was a shining key with bird wings attached to its artfully gilded stem. "Weird…"

He reached toward it and was just about to touch it when a pale hand grabbed his arm and immobilized his reach.

"Don't touch that."

Naruto glared at Sasuke and pulled his wrist out of the other's slackening grip; anger once again swelling in his breast at the other boy's nerve to tell him what to do. "I'll touch whatever I want to, bastard."

Sasuke just watched him silently, before finally turning away. "Whatever."

Naruto glanced back at the floating key, twinkling at him invitingly, but he didn't move to touch it again. Instead, he turned around and took a tour of some of the display cases on the other side of the room, far away from Sasuke.

The contents of the display cases weren't nearly as interesting or compelling as the floating key, in Naruto's opinion. One of the cases held a small book with holes pierced into it and ink splattered across the cover. Looked like a piece of junk. Another case held a large golden vase with characters inscribed in it that Naruto couldn't read. Whatever it was, it didn't look like anything special. But the third case caught his eye. It contained an egg that cracked open and hatched a bird, which flew around until it was full grown and then the process reversed and the bird was back inside a whole egg. Naruto watched this process four or five times, fully engrossed, before Sasuke called from across the room.

"Kakashi-sensei, these books aren't in Japanese."

Kakashi stood up from where he was inspecting a spot on the floor and walked over to Sasuke – Sakura and Naruto following after him. Kakashi took one of the books Sasuke was holding and opened it. Naruto and Sakura both peered passed his arms to get a good look at the writing in the book.

What Sasuke said was true. The writing wasn't familiar at all – it looked _simpler _and completely different from kanji. This really wasn't Japanese.

"Must be foreign," Kakashi stated the obvious. "Are there other books like this one?"

"As far as I've seen," Sasuke began, idly paging through another book off the shelf. "They're all like that one."

"Interesting," Kakashi murmured, taking another book off the shelf beside him and paging through it much like Sasuke had. "It seems as though all of these books are foreign. Now, the question is, how did Orochimaru get his hands on books like this? More importantly, what use did he have for them?"

"He must have at least been able to read them," Sakura observed from behind Kakashi as she pulled out a book of her own. "Otherwise, why would he have so many?"

"Good point," Kakashi replied. "Although, it is a possibility that he could have had someone who knew how to read them and translate them for him."

"True." Sakura flipped open a book to a page with gruesome looking pictures of people with boils growing all over their faces and people turning into different ferocious beasts in what looked to be an extremely painful process. "But where would he find someone like that? All the five shinobi nations speak and write in Japanese."

"There are other nations outside of the five shinobi nations, Sakura," Kakashi informed her, placing his book back on the shelf. "He probably employed the translator from the same source nation as the books."

"Other nations?" Naruto questioned confusedly, he had never heard of anywhere _outside _of the five great shinobi nations. "What other nations?"

"There are other places in the world that aren't nearly as hidden as our shinobi countries, Naruto." Kakashi looked down at him, his eye smiling and reflecting Naruto's face in the light. "We've just chosen to remain separate from them out of habit."

"Eeeeeeeh?" Naruto looked up at Kakashi skeptically. "Why haven't we learned about this in the academy then?"

Kakashi shrugged. "I suppose it doesn't really matter much. Since none of those other countries know that we exist, and are thus, not a threat in any way to our well-being."

"Although," Sasuke added forebodingly. "It seems, given these books – that isn't so true anymore. Someone from one of those other nations must know about this place…unless Orochimaru really did learn enough of the foreign language to make use of these books, which I doubt, because he spent a lot of his time training me in the last four years."

The group went silent after that. It was still painful for Naruto and Sakura, no matter how true they knew it was, that Sasuke had betrayed them in order to train under a crazy hack like Orochimaru. For Sasuke to just offer the information so flippantly was more than a little unnerving.

"Well, shall we look at other rooms?"

They all followed Kakashi back through the tunnel and into the dark entrance room, before walking through another tunnel and stepping out into an even darker room save one exception; a small spotlight shone over a tattered looking boot which sat innocuously in the middle of the floor.

One of Naruto's eyebrows raised in disbelief as he walked toward it. He stopped when he was standing above it, just within the spotlight.

Sure enough, it was just a tattered boot with frayed edges and barely intact shoelaces strung across its tongue. He kicked it experimentally and it fell over.

"What's so special about this?" he wondered aloud.

Soon, however, Sasuke was at his side and clamping his shoulder with a strong hand. "You shouldn't do that, moron. Who knows what it can do?"

"What are you talking about?" Naruto asked with a growl as he spun out of the Uchiha's grasp. "Nothing happened!"

"Hn" Sasuke eyed him as though he was as dumb as a door nail. "Just because nothing happened the first time, doesn't mean something won't happen the next time you try something. There's a reason why this thing is under a spotlight."

"Naruto," Sakura yelled from her place by the mouth of the tunnel. "I really think you should listen to Sasuke-kun."

"Whatever," Naruto replied petulantly, wanting to get Sasuke back for being such a goddamned smartass. He smirked when he realized what he could do, and reached down to pick up the boot.

Sasuke growled a bit and tried to push his arm out of the way, but Naruto grabbed hold of it before Sasuke could successfully push him back and Sasuke ended up grabbing the boot instead.

There were a few seconds of silence where nothing happened and Naruto was just about to gloat about how he was right and Sasuke was wrong when a strange sensation tugged from just behind his navel.

He looked over at Sasuke and noticed that the other boy must have felt the same thing, because his black eyes were glaring at him with something akin to bloody murder.

In the next few seconds, the tug increased until he felt as though he was going to be ripped away from the boot, except for the fact that he couldn't seem to let go of the boot in the first place. He only had a second to realize the egregious error of his actions, before he and Sasuke were flung into the air in a rush of light and sound, just barely able to hear the shocked scream of Sakura and Kakashi's tinny yell.

And through all the frenzy around them, Naruto could still see Sasuke watching him from the opposite side, promising him a gruesome death after endless days of torture, entirely through the power of his glare.

_Ah…shit_.

…………………………………………………………………….

AN: (1) Tee-hee….I just couldn't resist!

TBC…


	2. The Portkey

Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter or Naruto. Never will.

AN: Thank you for all of your reviews. They make me feel happy and gay.

'Japanese'

"English"

Sinking Into Sweet Uncertainty

Chapter 1: The Portkey

'oomf!'

Naruto hit the hard earth with his back in a harsh crash, effectively knocking all of the air he had left out of his lungs. His hand finally let go of the boot he had made the mistake of touching in the first place and a long, pained groan escaped his lips. It only took him a second longer to notice that large, wet droplets were hitting his face and soaking into his clothing. Grudgingly, he opened his cerulean eyes with a hand shielding his face to see murky rain clouds collecting through the dark tree tops of what looked to be a dense forest.

It was raining. Naruto frowned at this discovery and the awful pain in his back. Strange, he couldn't remember the weather being nearly this bad before they entered that creepy abandoned laboratory. And wasn't it supposed to be late summer? Rain was never nearly this cold during the summer.

'Ugh…you are such…a fucking moron.'

Naruto turned his head, which sent a jolt of pain into the back of his neck and reminded him of why exactly he had been so reluctant to stand up, and looked over at Sasuke who seemed to be in the same exact shape.

The other boy was glaring at him as rain drops hit his dirty face and clung to his messy black bangs and long, feminine eyelashes.

Naruto just sent him a glare of his own. He really didn't have time for the bastard's criticism – especially since he was already beating himself up for his stupidity. 'You didn't _have _to touch the boot too, y'know!'

'Hn,' Sasuke just rolled his eyes slightly, before hoisting himself up until he was sitting and surveying their surroundings.

Naruto frowned at his companion's inadequate response, but mimicked his actions – sitting up and looking at the surrounding forest. The forest was almost unnaturally dark with twisted trees that seemed to give off a foreboding aura. The only way he could even see each individual branch was because the fat rain drops hit everything and made the surfaces glow with the half-light from the roiling sky above.

'Where are we?' Naruto questioned, testing his legs before standing and staring up into the branches of the strangely crippled trees. 'D'ya think we're near Konoha?'

Sasuke was already inspecting one of the trees and placing his hand against the bark as though analyzing it by touch. 'This isn't anywhere near Konoha,' Sasuke replied, turning slightly toward Naruto with his hand still pressed against the trunk of the tree. 'The trees aren't the same.'

Naruto frowned, already feeling the chill of the rain as it soaked into his clothes and nipped his skin. 'Then, where the hell are we!'

Sasuke didn't answer, but his eyes bled a dark crimson, denoting his activation of the sharingan, and he scanned the area with a slight frown pulling at his mouth. He looked at Naruto and the red receded back into black. He looked slightly dumbfounded, which was rare for him. 'I can't see anything passed ten feet around us. It's too dark.'

'Great,' Naruto replied sarcastically, jumping a bit when a bird squawked loudly in the tree canopy above him.

By now he was soaked to the bone and cold, but he held back his urge to shiver in front of Sasuke, who looked relatively calm and collected even though he must have been just as wet. _Maybe, the bastard was cold blooded_, Naruto thought. Wouldn't be a big surprise, considering he used to make a habit out of hanging around with snakes. Naruto chuckled a bit at his own private joke, which had Sasuke eyeing him in a way that told Naruto plainly he was not nearly as amused by the situation.

Naruto sighed and scratched the back of his head in annoyance. 'Fine, whatever. Let's just find a way out of this forest and get home.' He was about to add that the place uberly creeped him out, but he didn't want to look weak in front of Sasuke. So, he just left it at that.

He pondered taking the boot with him, but then thought better of it now that he was fully aware of the true power it had to screw him over. So, he just left it and made his way through the forest, Sasuke following silently behind him – which may have been the creepiest thing about this whole state of affairs in the first place.

What seemed like hours later, Naruto's mood shifted from crap to worse. The forest seemed to have gotten _darker_, if that were possible, and there was still no sign of a way out. In fact, he didn't want to admit it, but he couldn't even tell if they hadn't been walking in circles this whole time. Plus, there were spider webs _everywhere_. He had to constantly pull webbing out of his hair and off of his clothes as he walked.

'We're lost, idiot.'

Naruto stopped and turned around to confront Sasuke with a great deal of his building annoyance. It gave his ego a small boost to note that the pale boy looked like a drowned cat by now, his black hair matted down against his head and his sopping clothing pasted against his pale body. However, that was barely enough to satiate his growing frustration with their situation and Sasuke's complete lack of help.

'Well, if _you _know a better way to get out of here then tell me…smartass!' Naruto huffed hotly, adding the last swear word as a type of crowning remark to his darkening mood for the other boy. 'I'll show you…!'

Naruto's rant trailed off when he heard something scuffle within the foliage behind him – something big. He whipped around and pulled a kunai out of his holster pocket on reflex, guarding himself with the pointed weapon held out between him and the spot where the brush had moved unnaturally.

He could feel Sasuke standing guardedly right behind him and a little to his right, the boy's chakra slightly flaring around the edges. Naruto squinted into the darkness, but nothing else moved. At least, not that he could hear.

He stood like that for a long moment, before he finally began to drop his guard and lower his kunai. That, however, was a big mistake, because right at that moment something screeched horribly to his left and Naruto barely had time to switch his gaze and look up in horror as something big, hairy, and many-legged flew at him – silhouetted grotesquely against the darkened sky as it fell.

'Naruto, look out!'

'Aaauuughhhh!' Naruto could do nothing but put up his arms to protect his head and he closed his eyes, readying himself for the impending collision. But, instead of the forceful attack he was expecting there was the sound of metal piercing flesh and a loud screeching howl, almost like a human scream.

Naruto opened his eyes immediately to see Sasuke standing in front of him, pushing his long katana into the belly of the hugest spider Naruto had ever seen.

Naruto's legs gave out and he fell onto his bottom, watching wide-eyed as Sasuke pushed the stiff spider off of his blade and onto the forest floor with a heavy thump. The spider's legs curled into its abdomen as it went through its final death throes and Sasuke stepped back and watched it while rubbing his blade against his pants until the spider went completely still.

Naruto closed his mouth which had been hanging open loosely when Sasuke turned his attention down to him. Naruto stumbled to his feet, not wanting to allow the boy too much pleasure at his expense. Naruto's hands balled into fists, his breathing harsh as the rain continued to fall through the canopy above.

Where in the gods' names _were_ they?

Sasuke was halfway through sheathing his sword, an arrogant look of satisfaction painted across his stuck up face, when ominous clicking sounds emanated from all around them.

Naruto unconsciously moved over near Sasuke and peered around, wide-eyed, as Sasuke once again fully unsheathed his sword and narrowed his crimson gaze across the surrounding brush.

Naruto held his breath and the clicking noise ceased for a moment, before the bushes and trees practically writhed with activity.

The sight made his skin crawl, watching with a sort of expectant terror as spiders just as big as the one Sasuke had killed, scuttled out into the open – they're long hairy legs thumping powerfully against the branches and trunks of the trees, and on the forest floor. Naruto surprisingly managed to keep his cool, but that was until Sasuke looked up and Naruto followed the gaze – spotting what must have been hundreds of spiders sliding down to them on their tethered webbing.

'What the…! Not _again_!' Naruto exclaimed, heart pounding within his chest as Sasuke tensed and the spiders continued to close in on them. Naruto bit his lip in fear, watching with terrified fascination as one of the spiders clicked its pincers and reflected Naruto's horrified visage in its eight black and shiny eyes.

Sasuke surprised Naruto by sheathing his sword, but he immediately raced through a number of hand seals and breathed in deeply, making his face look like an over-filled balloon. He placed a hand in front of his mouth, forming a ring with his thumb and forefinger, and released the air, shooting a gargantuan inferno of flame that swept across the spiders on the ground and in the trees.

The spiders screamed much like their fallen comrade had and the surrounding forest lit up with the orange-yellow flames, flickering dangerously all around them before going out completely under the falling rain and sending them all back into darkness.

Some of the spiders were now burnt to a crisp, but the others were definitely much more incensed than they had been before, and soon the entire surrounding forest was filled with their – what Naruto could only guess was – angry screeching.

'Shit!' Sasuke cursed at the small effect his technique had in pacifying the monsters. Indeed, it seemed to have made things undoubtedly worse.

But Naruto pulled himself together and stepped in front of Sasuke. After all, he wasn't going to be sitting around waiting for Sasuke to save him. He wasn't going to let that arrogant bastard have the satisfaction of beating him anymore!

Naruto's expression turned serious and his hands raced through a familiar combination of seals as the remaining spiders closed in. His loud voice cut through the air. 'KAGE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU!'

A hundred of his look-alikes popped up out of nowhere and surrounded Naruto and Sasuke, creating a barrier of orange and black between them and the huge spiders. The clones immediately attacked the spiders, ripping at the beasts with kunais that sent many of the monsters to the ground. The rain thickened as they fought until it seemed as though the entire forest would flood at any moment. By the end, however, only two clones were left and while all the spiders on the ground were dead, there were still the ones hanging above them in the dark canopy – waiting for their chance to spring.

'All of that, and you only managed to get the ones on the _ground_.'

'Shut up, _bastard_.'

Naruto's last two clones popped out of existence and Naruto and Sasuke were left staring up into the canopy with equally grim looks on their rain-drenched faces. The hanging spiders clicked at them menacingly, flexing their long legs as they slowly descended toward them.

This…was _really _bad.

'Run!' Naruto yelled, which seemed to act as a signal for the spiders as well, because their descent became considerably faster and their heavy bodies landed upon the ground, before neither Naruto nor Sasuke could get very far.

'Damnit!' Naruto yelled, his voice harsh and full of menace, as he formed a powerful blue ball of swirling energy in his right hand and plowed through a bunch of the oncoming spiders.

Sasuke did the same thing with his Chidori, and soon both boys were running for their lives through the brush.

Naruto growled and jumped up into the trees, springing from branch to branch with Sasuke hot on his tail. Branches scraped across his face and limbs, but he didn't pay them much heed. A few scratches were decidedly better than becoming dinner for a pack of wild demon-spiders.

He couldn't really hear the spiders anymore over the rain that was still pounding on the earth and against his cold ears, but he kept on running just in case. He could feel Sasuke panting slightly a little ways behind him. So, he didn't have to look back to check that the teen was still alive.

The cold air bit at his wet skin and rain drops stung his cheeks and obstructed his vision. Naruto was just about to jump to another tree when he realized too late that there were no more trees and so he had the misfortune of jumping right out into nothing but air and tumbling down a slightly inclined grassy hillside…with large wet rocks embedded every few meters.

Naruto tumbled to a halt right at the bank of a huge body of water, which, he noticed blearily as he sat up and stared at it past the stars dancing in his vision, was glinting eerily under soft light from the moon that had just peaked out passed a large traveling storm cloud in the night sky.

A soft thump sounded on his left and told him that Sasuke had just arrived smoothly by his side.

Naruto rubbed his sore elbows, which seemed to have taken the brunt of his fall down the small hill and he shook his head in a poor attempt to clear his vision completely of the resulting dizziness. He looked around at Sasuke, who was gazing out across the water.

'Well, at least we made it out of the forest,' Naruto stated, finally standing up and brushing dirt off of the knees of his favorite orange pants.

'Although, that may have been the least of our problems,' Sasuke replied softly, still looking across the water intently.

'What d'you…?' But Naruto suddenly went silent when he finally took a look for himself.

There, on a cliff that jutted out above the other side of the black lake, was a huge dark building made entirely of stone. Naruto's mouth nearly dropped open in shock for the second time that night as he surveyed the monolithic structure with pointy roofs that nearly touched the sky and many small windows that blazed like fiery pinpricks against the rest of the shadowy fortress. He had never seen anything so…so _foreign _in his life. 'We're not anywhere near Konoha, are we?'

He looked over at Sasuke who seemed to be thinking the same thing, and the pale boy answered by shaking his head. His voice was low as droplets from the passing rainstorm clung to his hair. 'Wherever that boot took us…we must be very far away.'

Naruto felt his stomach tighten uncomfortably at Sasuke's confirmation of his worst fears. His voice came out hoarser than normal as he stared at the forbidding scene across the lake. 'Do you think t-that…that we've traveled passed the five shinobi nations? Like what Kakashi was talking about earlier?'

Sasuke placed a hand on his chin in his usual pensive pose, before he finally replied – a frown marring his face and a crease developing on his brow. 'Most likely.'

Naruto sighed dramatically, suddenly feeling incredibly drained – which wasn't very familiar for him, unless he had been training all day every day for a week straight. First giant man-eating spiders and now _this_! What _next_? He didn't think he could take it anymore.

'As usual, you somehow managed to get us into more trouble with your mind-numbing stupidity, idiot.'

Naruto clenched his fists and glared at Sasuke with fire in his eyes. 'AGAIN, I say you didn't _have _to touch that boot in the _first _place, bastard!'

'Hn.'

Sasuke looked nonplussed at Naruto's reaction, which made Naruto want to do nothing less than bash the prick's face in…more than a couple of times. However, this burning desire was short lived as voices traveled across the water and entered his sensitive ears.

Naruto's gaze swiveled to a spot across the lake and was surprised to see a huge group of people – no, shorter than adults – children, dressed in black, all walking toward the lake behind a huge hairy _thing_. Naruto squinted, but he still couldn't quite make out the _thing_. Whatever it was, it was huge…and hairy, and walked on two legs from what he could tell.

Naruto could feel Sasuke's chakra signature perk up in interest just slightly behind him – the teen had clearly noticed the strange developments as well and he was watching the group just as intently as Naruto.

When the group reached the lake, the giant hairy mass entered one of the small wooden boats moored by the shore and the children followed after; all getting in until about twenty boats were full. Then, inexplicably, without wind or rowing-power, the boats began to move slowly across the obsidian water toward the black fortress on the imposing cliff. The sky had cleared a bit, but the water was still a bit choppy – sending waves into the boats and soaking everyone in them. It really didn't look like a very efficient way to travel, but maybe it was the only way they could get to that building, Naruto thought quizzically.

Obviously they knew where they were going and they looked pretty harmless as most of them were children. Although they were all wearing black, which was a symbol of a deadly shinobi, but…

Naruto weighed the options in his head. Maybe they were his only chance of getting out of here. He _really _didn't want to be stuck here anymore with huge-ass spiders, creepy forests, and _Sasuke _following him around. He nodded his head slightly when he had confirmed his decision. He was going to have to take the risk.

'Hey!' Naruto bellowed toward the boats, which were now already gliding across the middle of the lake. 'Could you help us, over here? We're lo…hmph!'

'shut _up_, idiot!' Sasuke hissed into his ear with his pale hand clamped over Naruto's mouth, which, despite the situation, managed to send a warm tingle up and down Naruto's spine.

Naruto glared at the Uchiha and growled, before wriggling out of Sasuke's grasp. He pushed down the uneasiness he had felt by being so close to the teen and transferred that into anger at having been derailed from his plan. 'Mind your own business, asshole!'

Sasuke just looked at him as though he thought Naruto was as dimwitted as the rock he was standing on.

That _bastard_; always thinking he knew _everything_! If anything else, Naruto was going to make sure he got back to Konoha as soon as possible so that he would never have to take on a mission with Sasuke, _ever_ again.

Mind set, Naruto looked back across the water and saw that the boats were all nearly to the other side. No one must have heard him. So, before Sasuke could even think to snatch him back, Naruto took off across the water toward the boats.

'_Naruto!_'

Naruto ignored Sasuke's exasperated call as he framed his mouth with his hands and yelled out again while he sprinted over the water, 'Hey! Could you help me? I need to get back to the hidden village of Konoha!'

By now, heads began to swivel in his direction and some of the children even began to point as he ran toward them over the choppy waves. He smiled and waved at them, but most of them just stared back at him as though he was the oddest thing they had ever seen. Some of them even looked frightened. Naruto ignored the voice in the back of his head that was hinting to him that this might have been a _very_ bad idea, and drowned it out by yelling again as he got closer to the last of the boats.

'I need directions to KO-NO-HA!'

He made sure to enunciate his village's name, but no one on the boats answered him and, in fact, more of them were pointing at him now – some with their mouths agape. He could hear them speaking to each other in tiny, high pitched voices, but no matter how hard he strained to understand what they were saying, he couldn't. It might've been due to the sound of the waves as they clapped against each other beneath his feet, but a sinking feeling in his gut told him that was most likely far from the real reason for the communication disconnect.

He stopped running as he neared one of the last boats and was about to yell out again, when something slimy and bumpy wrapped around his ankle. Naruto swiveled his attention downward and nearly jumped out of his skin at the sight. There, coming straight up out of the water, was a huge, pink, octopus tentacle and it was wrapped snuggly around his lower leg.

'AAAUUUUGGGGHHHH!'

He pulled another kunai out of his pouch and some of the children in the boats behind him screamed as well, as a huge, bulbous pink _something _surfaced not too far away.

Naruto barely had time to register that this was probably one of the _worst _days of his entire life, before he was tugged all the way into the murky water below. In his shock, his mouth had opened and he swallowed a good deal of the lake water, making his lungs already feel like they were on fire. He began to feel dizzy and fuzzy around the edges as he was tugged lower and lower into the murky deep by his ankle.

He tried to struggle against the hold, but it was difficult to bend down with the force of his descent. Blearily, he looked up to the surface where the moon shone down on the water and through his rising panic he vaguely noticed some of the lagging boat bottoms floating above in stark contrast to the light.

He could feel the pressure of the water increase upon his exhausted body as he was pulled ever deeper and he wondered if this was really going to be the end of it all. _What a stupid way to die_, he thought morosely as his eyelids fell to half mast. _Hardly worthy of a future Hokage…and it was all _Sasuke's _fault too_…

He had just gone completely limp, when a strong hand gripped his wrist and tugged him upwards with three great heaves and Naruto could feel the wake of sharp pieces of metal whizzing past him and into the deep. The tentacles receded from his ankle and his body rose quickly with the help of the other's strength, and soon he was gasping for breath after breaking the cold surface.

Naruto heaved while someone hit him hard in the back and the water in his lungs came up along with the remnants of bile in his empty stomach. Naruto heaved once more on reflex, before wiping his mouth shakily and looking over at his savior.

Sasuke was looking back at him with an expression of concern and something else, his black hair once again completely flattened against his head as water droplets collected on his eyelashes and ran down his pale cheeks.

Naruto completely forgot to scowl and he felt his face heat up instead. He looked away as his heart beat a mile a minute, trying to push down the nameless emotions that had been plaguing him ever since that _incident_ and replace them with indignation at the other boy for making him feel that way in the first place – but he felt entirely too weak to put in the effort, which was _new _to say the least. It already took him a bit more concentration to keep his chakra at the right level for crouching on top of the water. So, he opted for turning his gaze to a boat that was making its way back toward them and ignoring the soft weight of Sasuke's hand that still rested upon his cold back.

A figure on the boat called out into the night, but Naruto couldn't understand the words at all.

"It's alrigh' firs' years!" The giant figure waved with his enormous hands out toward the other boats. "Jus' the giant squid comin' out ter play. Nothin' ter worry 'bout!"

Naruto suddenly noticed all the eyes on him as the boats began to move again toward the fortress. The children were all still watching him in shock and awe and some of them were talking excitedly to one another in high pitch voices. Yet, again, no matter how much he strained his ears, he couldn't understand any of what they said.

Sasuke's chakra flared beside him and Naruto was snapped away from watching the boats full of children slowly glide away to switch his attention to the boat that was now right beside them. Naruto looked up and saw a huge hairy man with a mismatched fur skin coat looking down at him with beady, black eyes. A bunch of children were peering from out behind the man's bulk in interest at Naruto and Sasuke as they sat below on the water.

Naruto tensed a bit, but couldn't keep the surprise he felt from showing on his face as he looked up at the unnaturally enormous man. He didn't think anyone that tall had ever existed.

"You two alrigh'? The squid didn' hurt ya, did she?"

Confused, Naruto looked over at Sasuke for support, but the boy clearly hadn't understood any of it either – and his eyes were red with the sharingan. He probably was analyzing the man for any genjutsu that could make him have such an enormous girth.

"Professor," a little girl with curly dirty-blonde hair squeaked from behind the man's furry back, before she poked her head out on the side. "I don't think they can understand us."

"Eh?" The man's voice boomed from behind his bushy mustache and beard. He looked Naruto and Sasuke over as though he was in deep thought. "Well, tha's strange."

Then, he bent down, and before Naruto knew what was happening, the large man had grabbed him and Sasuke by the collars with his enormous hands as if they were dogs and placed them on the boat among the smaller children.

"I better take 'em ter Dumbledore."

Sasuke barely struggled against the treatment, which surprised Naruto a bit, but Sasuke gave him a look that told Naruto clearly to remain complacent until Sasuke could think up a plan. Naruto frowned and huffed a bit at Sasuke's nerve, but he otherwise remained silent. He was tired and all of the shorter children were huddled as far away as possible from them on such a small boat – whispering to each other and staring.

Naruto sighed, suddenly suffering from uncomfortable flashbacks of his childhood when all the villagers would do was stare at him and point – back when he never even knew why.

He ignored the children and Sasuke, for that matter, until the boat finally stopped at the other shore of the lake and the big man got out, beckoning them all to follow.

The children scuttled along in their strange black robes, sneaking looks back at Naruto and Sasuke who were following at a slower, more calculated pace behind them. The cliff dropped off on this side of the lake and they all followed the furry man up the incline until they were at the steps to the fortress – which suddenly looked _a lot _bigger now that they were right beside it.

Naruto craned his neck and looked up the towering side of the building, all the way until it touched the star-dotted sky above. His voice was barely a whisper as his eyes widened at the imposing effect. 'Wow…'

He looked over and noticed that there was a small road leading up to the building, littered with what seemed to be a line of black rickshaws, only bigger. But that wasn't what drew his attention in the first place, there were harnesses jutting out of them with the most gruesome creatures Naruto had ever seen. Naruto took a step closer and a pair of white, milky eyes slid toward him, placed within the very boney black face of what looked to be a very emaciated horse. The anorexic horse watched him eerily as he stepped around it at a fair distance to see that the creature also sported two huge bat wings that protruded unnaturally out of its skinny shoulder blades. Naruto made a disgusted face, but the horse became bored of him and finally looked away in favor of pawing the ground with its paw-like hooves emphatically.

Light flooded Naruto's surroundings and he realized that the large man had pushed open two huge doors, which he walked through, followed by the children. Strangely enough, the children looked more anxious than Naruto felt as he walked back over to the door step and followed Sasuke into the building, peering around them cautiously.

The room they had stepped into was bright, lit by torches along the walls and past the corners into hallways that Naruto couldn't see down very well from his position. Everything was stone, just like the outside, and a large staircase rose from the left side of the room. The ceiling was vaulted in stone, much like that creepy room in Orochimaru's abandoned laboratory, but brighter and…less creepy.

All of the children lined up, fidgeting beneath their wet robes, in front of another set of doors as a strict looking woman with a tight bun addressed them. Naruto thought no one had a bigger stick up their butt then Sasuke, but he might have been wrong now that he had seen this woman. With a straight back and severe features, she looked like she could very well be harboring a _pole_.

Naruto tried not to snicker, before she turned her attention to the two of them and the giant man who was standing in front of them – partially hiding them from view.

"Hagrid, who are these?"

The large man shuffled to the side so that both Naruto and Sasuke were in plain view of the woman, who was looking at them with slightly wide eyes and a confused frown. Naruto just looked up at her warily, suddenly feeling nervous under her critical gaze.

"Ah…these two?" The giant man spoke in a booming voice, but he sounded slightly sheepish as he looked at the woman. "I found 'em in the lake. Nothin' ter worry 'bout. Just gonna show 'em to Dumbledore."

"In the _lake_?" The woman looked disbelieving as she regarded the giant.

"Well…yeah…" The giant rubbed his beard as though he was nervous. "They were…erm…playin' with Bessie an'…"

"With _Bessie_?" The woman looked incredulous, gaze switching between the giant and Naruto and Sasuke intermittently.

"Yeah," The man's booming voice stumbled a bit, which Naruto could understand, because the woman was very nearly successful at giving the impression that she was looking down on him even though the man was, physically, much taller than her. "The giant squid."

The woman just stared at him for a bit, before shaking her head and letting out a little sigh – an act that made her look remarkably looser than Naruto thought possible. "Fine, but go in after the first years. No need to delay the feast."

She then turned around on her heal, all her previous stiffness fully restored, and lead the squirming children past the other doors – revealing a large, bright room with large tables and even more people sitting at them. The children shuffled through and then the doors closed shut with a satisfyingly heavy sound, leaving Naruto and Sasuke alone with the giant, hairy man.

"Jus' got ter wait a bit now. Until they're all done sortin'."

The man was talking to them as though explaining something, but Naruto really couldn't understand anything he was saying. He smiled a bit nervously back at the man, before the man smiled down at him in return beneath his copious amount of facial hair, and turned away.

Naruto seriously began to wonder whether that man wasn't a few noodles short of a ramen bowl, before he glanced over at Sasuke and whispered – which still managed to echo a little across the stone walled room. 'Do you have any idea what is going on? How come no one speaks our language?'

Sasuke frowned a little, before replying, arms crossed over his mostly bare chest. 'There's certainly no doubt about it now. We aren't within the five shinobi nations. We've probably traveled a far distance to a nation that is completely foreign.'

Naruto frowned, taking what Sasuke said into consideration. 'But, why would that dirty old boot take us here when it belonged to Orochimaru?'

'Hn,' Sasuke replied lowly as the large furry man beckoned them over to the double doors. 'This is probably related to those foreign books Orochimaru collected. This may be the same nation that produced them.'

'So what are we gonna do now?' Naruto whispered back as he and Sasuke walked as slowly as possible to where the man was standing and holding one of the doors open a crack.

'We'll have to wait it out and see where this gets us.' Sasuke answered, his expression deathly serious. 'Until we collect more information, we shouldn't act.'

Naruto sighed frustratedly. He was never one for waiting to do anything, but after everything that had happened because of his impatience – which was hard to admit – he was now willing to control himself. Shikamaru was right, life _was_ troublesome.

He could hear a lot of voices behind the doors and the clanking of cutlery on plates as he stopped behind the man's huge coat and waited. The man smiled down at them and used his large hands to push open the doors completely and step through the threshold.

Naruto and Sasuke followed the man down the middle of the room, which was divided by four long tables, two on each side. Naruto looked up and nearly gasped when he saw that the ceiling looked exactly like the sky outside without actually being open to the elements. Stars twinkled within the black velvet projection and then dropped off into nothing halfway down the walls from the ceiling.

Naruto dropped his head when he once again felt the familiar tingle in his shoulder blades that meant he was being watched. The room had gone eerily silent and when he looked around at the tables, the kids – no, some of them looked older than Naruto – were watching him and Sasuke intently. Some even had food hanging half way out of their mouths which they seemed to have forgotten to chew as they stared at Naruto and Sasuke wide-eyed.

He tried to ignore there shocked gazes and looked straight ahead until their guide stepped off to the side and stopped in front of a small table at the head of the room, revealing a row of adults – sitting much like an Hokage would with the village officials – who were all looking down at Naruto and Sasuke in curiosity.

The large man finally spoke – addressing a man with a long crooked nose who seemed to be even hairier than him, although certainly older. "Headmaster, I found these kids out on tha lake, an' they don' speak our language." He turned a bit to regard Naruto and Sasuke. "I don' think they're students, either."

The old man's bushy white eye brows knotted a bit over his crystal blue eyes as he stood up from his chair to better regard Naruto and Sasuke through his strange, half-moon glasses. The rest of the hall was broken of its eerie silence as the teenagers and children in black robes began to murmur amongst themselves – but that immediately ceased when the old man held up a long stick in his right hand and pointed it down in Naruto and Sasuke's direction.

"Intereo fidelis."(1)

Naruto tensed, expecting some sort of attack, when an odd feeling came over him and temporarily made all of his thoughts feel jumbled and chaotic in his head. Eventually, the confusion washed away and everything felt remarkably clear – as though he had been operating under a haze all of his life.

When he came back to himself, he looked up at the old man who was smiling down at him in a comforting way, and blurted, "What the hell did you do to me, old geezer?"

The room went silent again as Naruto clapped a hand over his mouth. He doubted whether he wouldn't be able to hear a pin drop in the deafening stillness that followed.

"Good," The man's smile grew exponentially and his eyes twinkled almost mischievously as regarded both Naruto and Sasuke. "I can see now that everything is in working order. My name is Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and _you_ are?"

Naruto's legs almost fell out from under him for the second time that day. This was just _too _strange.

………………………………………………………….

AN: (1) latin for: "reverse untranslation" (complicated, I know)

TBC…


	3. An Unlikely Meeting

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Harry Potter. So quit asking before I give you a taste of my bat-bogey hex.

AN: In case there are some of you who aren't aware, and I suspect there are many of you out there. I changed the chapter before this due to some helpful comments I received both on ffnet and the sasuxnaru LJ community about it's inscupulous content. The changes aren't big. So you can survive without rereading it. I just thought I'd let you know.

Thank you for all of your encouragement. This chapter was very hard to write.

Sinking Into Sweet Uncertainty

Chapter 2: An Unlikely Meeting

"My name is Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and _you_ are?"

Naruto looked up into the man's weathered old face in some form of shock, but he managed to pull himself together enough to remember that there had been a question directed at him at the end of the man's introduction.

"uh…er…" Naruto fumbled over his reply, already feeling really weird that his thoughts were still a mix of his native Japanese and this new language that was now trying, with some difficulty, to overtake his stubborn, native tongue and push it out into oblivion. "My name is…"

The old man – Dumbledore, did he say his name was? – was now watching him intently and yet patiently, with an odd smile tugging at the sides of his mouth.

Naruto rubbed his temples, much like Shikamaru would do after only five minutes into a mission. What _was _his name? He searched his mind for clues, but for some unfathomable reason, he kept on encountering the image of those fish cakes that usually sat on the top of ramen noodles. With growing frustration at coming up completely blank on the information he just knew he _used _to know, Naruto did what he usually did in a tight spot. He became incredibly loud.

"MY NAME IS…" Naruto stepped up and gesticulated wildly, much like he used to do when he was declaring himself the next Hokage to people who wouldn't listen or didn't care. He stuck his index finger up into the air, importantly. "SWIRLY FISHCAKE SPIRAL!"

Naruto dropped the hand he had used to point, so emphatically, up toward the ceiling – knowing that there was something really, almost _criminally_ wrong with his answer. He tried to ignore the muttered, _moron_, he could hear emanating from the Sasuke's position to his right – by laughing stupidly and rubbing the back of his head in embarrassment. Yet soon, that was completely unnecessary as the entire room burst into a din of raucous laughter.

Naruto turned around to see that all the people, sitting at the tables, were laughing heartily and some were even pointing at him. Naruto slouched and his hands balled up into angry fists – this was worse than the times he had made mistakes on missions when there had only been Sasuke to taunt him.

He stomped toward the tables angrily. "OH YEAH? WELL…!" But he really didn't know how to smartly rebuke them above the noise of the crowd.

He could feel his skin become warm and tingly, which denoted that his chakra was flaring around him threateningly. This got some people's attention and some of them had stopped laughing altogether – staring at him now in wide-eyed shock and fear.

"His name is Naruto Uzumaki."

Naruto turned around and the laughter in the room died out completely. Sasuke was standing confidently in front of Dumbledore and his panel of compatriots – looking up at the old man stonily. Naruto's chakra receded and, once again – for the billionth time in his life – he felt embarrassed by and envious of Uchiha Sasuke.

"And I am Sasuke Uchiha."

"Ah…I see." Dumbledore's half-moon spectacles flashed as he nodded his head slighty in understanding. He looked completely serene as though there hadn't been that slight altercation just moments ago. "A pleasure to meet you both."

He nodded toward Naruto, who was now standing beside Sasuke and avoiding looking at the haughty boy. "My apologies for the earlier confusion. That spell may addle your brains a bit before it finally takes hold." He said this as though it was the most normal thing to say to a person, but it just made Naruto feel even more awkward and tense – although he tried not to show it.

"Where, may I ask, do you two call from?"

"We are from the shinobi hidden village of the Leaf in the Fire country," Sasuke replied monotonously.

"Shinobi?"

"Yeah!" Naruto piped up, finally feeling that his brain was less rattled than before, and not wanting Sasuke to steal the entire spotlight. "Um…it's like…a ninja village. Does that make any sense?"

The rest of the hall was muttering now, and Naruto could hear the word, _ninja_, being batted around above the murmur in incredulous tones. Indeed,the adults, sitting on either side of Dumbledore, were shooting Naruto and Sasuke strange looks. One of them, with black greasy hair and a long hooked nose was almost sneering at them.

Dumbledore, however, looked thoughtful. "Well, that does make sense, but I had certainly thought ninja were a thing of the past. Of course, not many people in the world know about the continued existance of Witches and Wizards either."

"Witches and Wizards?" Naruto repeated questioningly. He had never even heard of such things in his life.

Dumbledore smiled but his attention was diverted toward the back of the room when the two large oaken doors slammed shut. Naruto turned around along with Sasuke to see that another boy, who wasn't wearing black robes, walked into the room. His hair was a mess of black that contrasted with his pale skin and he looked a bit dirty. Yet, the strangest and most startling thing about him was the fact that blood was pasted across the lower half of his face and into his shirt as though he had just suffered a terrible nosebleed.

Naruto could tell that this boy was important in some way, because everyone's attention had shifted toward him and people were whispering behind their hands as he passed them – obviously trying to ignore them.

The boy finally looked toward the top of the room and startlingly green eyes, behind the lenses of thick-rimmed circular glasses, locked with Naruto's cerulean ones. They stared at each other for what seemed like hours – the boy seemed a little taken aback by Naruto's presence, before he switched his gaze toward Sasuke with much the same expression.

The entire audience seemed to be watching this exchange with a sick form of anticipation – switching from Naruto and Sasuke to the boy as though they expected something extraordinary to happen. But the boy only looked up past Naruto's left shoulder to Dumbledore questioningly, before he turned away and took a seat at one of the tables and abruptly started shoveling food into his mouth in a most unnatural way – as though he was doing his best to act casual and ignore the stares he was getting.

For some strange reason, Naruto got the distinct impression that this boy was very like Sasuke. Although, he was clearly very different in look and mannerism. Overall, it was a very odd impression that made him feel even more jumbled in the head.

Either way, the boy had clearly been involved in a fight, or maybe he had come across those giant spiders as well. Somehow, that seemed unlikely though. Naruto had seen a lot of injuries in his life as a shinobi and he could tell just by looking at the boy and the way the blood stuck to the area around his nose and down onto his chin that he had probably been kicked in the face…_hard_.

"Well, I suppose it would be best if we moved to a more private location in order to continue this discussion."

Naruto was pulled from his observations to see that Dumbledore had gotten up and was now making his way around the small table he had previously been sitting at. He stopped and looked over at the severe woman Naruto had seen earlier in the entrance room. "Professor McGonagal, if you please."

She nodded her head curtly and stood up as well, following him around the table.

He stopped in front of them and smiled down at Naruto and Sasuke before walking down the middle aisle of the room, the stiff woman walking briskly at his heals, as he beckoned them to follow with a slight flick of his left wrist.

Naruto shared a look with Sasuke, who nodded at him, before they followed the two strangely dressed adults down the middle aisle. The sound of people talking slowly rose until Naruto closed the thick doors behind him with a deceivingly soft click, and the room they left practically burst into loud voices and the sounds of clinking glass on plates as they all, presumably, resumed eating and discussed what they had just seen.

They walked through dark corridors as they followed Dumbledore and the woman, and Naruto couldn't help staring at the paintings that hung on the walls as their occupants moved around inexplicably. Some, like a portly looking man in a strange round black hat, looked back at Naruto in just as much interest. Needless to say, the portraits like that thoroughly creeped Naruto out, but it got him to thinking that maybe this whole experience was just a very elaborate genjutsu that was somehow instigated by touching that old, ratty boot. After all, he still hadn't figured out how he could suddenly understand these strange people's language when all that old man had done, as far as Naruto could tell, was speak in gibberish and wave about a knobbly wooden stick.

The corridors seemed to get darker, only lit by flickering torches set into the walls every few meters, until Dumbledore stopped in front of a golden statue in the shape of an animal Naruto had never seen before.

"That is a griffin." Dumbledore explained, smiling down at Naruto and clearly reading his confusion correctly.

Naruto almost jumped out of his skin when the griffin statue came to life and addressed Dumbledore in a slightly rude tone, asking for the password.

Dumbledore merely smiled back serenely. "Raspberry Jam."

The griffin went still again, all signs of its previous state of animation gone, before it swivelled and revealed a staircase behind where its gigantic wings once blocked the way.

Dumbledore stepped passed the threshold and began his ascent up the stairs, followed by the woman, McGonagal, then Naruto and Sasuke. Once they were all on the steps, Naruto felt a jerk beneath his feet and almost fall back against Sasuke – which he hastily diverted by feeding chakra into the soles of his feet – before he realized that the spiralling staircase was moving upward.

It stopped shortly after, and Dumbledore stepped out as everyone else followed, walking into a large, octagonal room with a desk in the middle and an assortment of trinkets lining the walls and shelves.

Naruto looked around in awe to see that the whole right wall was full of small portraits, each holding people whos eyes were fixed upon him and Sasuke alternately. Naruto felt a shiver raise goosebumps on his arms as he looked back at them warily.

"Oh, this is a strange pair," said a reasonably plump woman in a frame to the far right.

Naruto nearly jumped out of his skin as the woman looked him over appraisingly.

"This one's got whiskers!" A portrait of a man with a huge mustache covering half of his skinny face piped in a barely deciperable accent from Naruto's left. "Strange tattoos the youth are getting these days, eh?"

Naruto frowned and glanced around the room as Dumbledore took a seat behind the large desk and McGonagal had just taken a seat beside the desk, and finally over to Sasuke who looked as bored as ever. Why wasn't anyone _else_ weirded out by those things?

"Please don't mind them," Dumbledore said, pulling the stick in his hand up and swishing it in the air, which preceded the inexplicable appearance of two plush chairs, facing the desk. "They've only just woken up. Please sit."

Naruto nodded a bit dazedly, still a little uncomprehending of what the old man meant, but he went to sit in one of the plush chairs nonetheless – immediately sinking into the remarkably soft cushions. Sasuke mimicked his action only a moment later, sitting down in the chair to the left of his.

Dumbledore placed his stick in the air again and looked across the desk at them inquiringly. "Tea?"

Neither of them answered before two small cups with tiny handles popped out of nowhere and floated in the air in front of Naruto and Sasuke's faces. Naruto watched the cup in front of him in awe as a larger, porcelain tea kettle popped into existance and proceeded to pour a hot, amber liquid into the cup – which obediently set itself down on the wooden desk with a soft clink when full.

Naruto looked down at the cup as dark tea leaves swirled around the bottom through the hot liquid, before nodding up at Dumbledore with a new sense of awe. For some reason, he thought of Jiraiya – who was also an old geezer with long white hair to boot. But that perverted geezer always tried to look cool and failed miserably a large portion of the time. Naruto watched the wisened man across from him. This man didn't seem like that type at all. "Um…thanks."

He took a sip, but he didn't really like it. He tried not to show his dislike as he placed the cup back down on the desk. Sasuke hadn't even tried to touch his, but Dumbledore didn't seem to mind.

"Well then," Dumbledore began after taking a long draught of his own tea. "How is it that you came upon Hogwarts? I hear from Hagrid that you two were playing with the giant squid, although somehow I doubt that account properly conveys the seriousness of your situation."

The old man sounded as though he was making a joke, but he definitely wasn't laughing, just waiting for their reply in polite interest.

"Er…well, you see..." Naruto paused, not really knowing where to start.

"Just start at the beginning. That always seems to be the most logical point of entry." Dumbledore interjected helpfully, as though he had completely read Naruto's mind – which maybe, Naruto thought with growing shock, he _had_.

Naruto glanced over at Sasuke, but the pale boy remained silent as though waiting for Naruto to get on with the troublesome explanation. Naruto frowned a bit. As always, Naruto thought sarcastically, the stoic bastard was _loads_ of help.

Naruto sucked in a breath in preparation for the long, harrowing tale. Dumbledore looked at him expectantly.

"Well, first I was waiting on the bridge in the hidden village of the Leaf, because our shinobi team – Team 7 – was supposed to meet for the first time in four years." Naruto paused, glaring at Sasuke, who looked unaffected. Dumbledore's eyebrows perked up interestedly at the exchange, but he didn't interrupt. "Then we got the report from our team leader, Kakashi, that our first mission was to go over to an old abandoned lab of Orochimaru's and check it out."

He looked over at Dumbledore, realizing that the man probably didn't know who Orochimaru was. "Um…Orochimaru is an old pedophile who is a really bad guy…" Naruto paused, thinking with a finger placed on his lower lip, before continuing. "and he has this creepy fascination with immortality and snakes…and stupid young boys."

At this, Naruto glanced over at Sasuke, having meant that last remark as a jab at the stoic boy, but as usual, Sasuke didn't react in the slightest. His black eyes only slid toward Naruto and his mouth flattened to give him a dry, unamused expression.

"So," Naruto continued, frowning and then looking back at Dumbledore. "We went there and the place was a mess – full of stuff I had never seen before – and it was creepy; like, creepier than usual, creepy."

Suddenly Naruto remembered the eerie mural on the ceiling of the entrance room. He got chills just thinking about it. "And there was this _huge_ green, glowing painting on the ceiling that looked like a scull with a snake sliding through its mouth! I'd never seen anything like that in Orochimaru's places before."

He noticed that Dumbledore had perked up at that statement and the old man shared a significant look with the stern woman beside him – both of their eyebrows raised slightly in hidden meaning. Dumbledore looked back at Naruto, when he had paused in his story, and smiled at him encouragingly – looking just as unperturbed as he had before. "Please, continue."

From the corner of Naruto's eye, he could see Sasuke watching Dumbledore and McGonagal with a renewed interest. Naruto continued.

"So, then we walked through this small tunnel and ended up in this strange room that had lots of books and weird things in display cases." Naruto remembered the way Sakura looked in the aquamarine light as she watched a case that held a floating brain. He realized that he missed her already. At least with her here, he may have been able to talk with someone other than Sasuke and people he hardly knew about their predicament.

Dumbledore was watching him intently, however, so he broke himself out of his uncharacteristic nostalgia and stumbled on. "Well, anyway, the books in there were all in a foreign language." Naruto thought back to the letters and he uncannily recognized them, which he couldn't have done before. "They were definitely written in your language, but we couldn't understand them at the time, and Kakashi said that Orochimaru was most likely using them for something and getting someone to translate them for him."

Naruto paused, thinking. "Although, maybe he just had someone wave a stick and make him understand the language right away – like you did with us."

Dumbledore looked amused, but he didn't comment. Naruto could feel Sasuke's attention turned to him now, watching him with an expression that was indubitably thoughtful.

"Then, we went into another room," Naruto continued, already feeling the beginnings of shame at having to relive this particular moment in their journey. He decided to gloss it over. "And there was this boot sitting in the middle of a spotlight and I picked it up and Sasuke picked it up on the other side. Then, the next thing we knew, we were in that dark forest near the lake over there."

Naruto nodded toward the window in a corner of the room to indicate the lake he referred to, which was clearly visible – sparkling eerily in the moonlight – through the window's pane glass.

"We walked through the forest after that – in the rain." Naruto continued, but then he suddenly felt indignant as he looked at the old man and he stood up, his voice rising an octave. "And did you know that there are _man-eating_ spiders in that place? You should really get that checked! We nearly _died_! You know, you've got a major infestation problem; what with the spiders and t-the…the _giant squid_ in your lake! How do you people _live _in a place like this!"

"This said by the person with a village-destroying Demon Fox sealed within his stomach."

Naruto's head clicked stiffly toward Sasuke, who had a strange smirk on his face as he regarded him. Once again, Sasuke sounded cool and collected, and once again, Naruto was boiling under the boy's insurmountable smirk.

He glared at the boy for a long moment, before he brought up his hand in a threatening fist. "Why, you…!"

That was as far as he managed to get, however, before some indescribably strong force pushed Naruto back down into his seat – and he couldn't get up again. He looked over blearily across the desk to see Dumbledore smiling at them, his all-purpose stick once again held aloft in his left hand.

"That will do," Dumbledore placed his stick down into wherever he kept it, still watching Naruto and Sasuke in bemusement. "Although you may not know it, you two have been very helpful. Perhaps we can continue discussing this with an added guest?"

Naruto just nodded back, his anger at Sasuke ebbing away into confusion at Dumbledore's strange request. Immediately, he felt the oppressive force lift from his body and he moved his arms, which had stiffened a bit as they were held against the plush arms of his chair.

"Minerva." Dumbledore switched his oddly twinkling gaze to the woman who sat to his right. "Please go and fetch Harry. He should be here with us as we discuss this further."

The woman, whom Naruto could now guess was named Minerva McGonagal, stood up briskly and walked out of the room without even looking at Naruto or Sasuke as she left.

……………………………………………………………………….

"Where've you – blimey, what've you done to your face?" said Ron, goggling at Harry along with everyone else in the vicinity.

"Why, what's wrong with it?" said Harry, grabbing a spoon and squinting at his distorted reflection.

"You're covered in blood!" said Hermione. "Come here – "

She raised her wand, said, "_Tergeo_!" and siphoned off the dried blood.

"Thanks," said Harry, feeling his now clean face. "How's my nose looking?"

"Normal," said Hermione anxiously. "Why shouldn't it? Harry, what happened? We've been terrified!"

"I'll tell you later," said Harry curtly. He was very conscious that Ginny, Neville, Dean, and Seamus were listening in; even Nearly Headless Nick, the Gryffindor ghost, had come floating along to eavesdrop.

"But – " said Hermione.

"Not now, Hermione," said Harry, in a darkly significant voice. He had hoped very much that they would all assume he had been involved in something heroic, preferably involving a couple of Death Eaters and a Dementor; Instead of the truth, which involved Malfoy, an underhanded stunning spell, and a swift kick to Harry's face.

He really didn't need to relive the embarrassment at having been completely helpless in a train compartment due to Malfoy's uncharacteristic quick-wittedness, not when so many eyes were still on him from across the hall. So, he switched his gaze over to the front where Dumbledore's chair sat completely empty and the confusion from earlier hit him all over again.

"More importantly, who were those strange people Dumbledore exited the hall with?"

"Wouldn't we all like to know?" replied Ron, stuffing pudding into his mouth with less vigor as a look of confusion crossed his face. "You missed loads of stuff while you were gone."

"Well, they did give us a lot of information about themselves before Harry came, didn't they?" Hermione asked astutely as she sent a withering glance at Ron, who was now trying to stuff more pudding into his mouth than it could possibly hold. "They told Dumbledore they were ninjas from the hidden village of the Leaf in the Fire country."

"Where's that?" Harry asked, hoping Hermione already knew the answer, as he reached out for more pudding – but she looked blank.

"I don't know," she said. "I haven't even heard of a _Fire _country before – although I suppose its somewhere in or near Japan."

"How'd you figure that?" asked Ron, looking over at her wide-eyed as pudding dribbled innocuously down his chin.

"Well, it's obvious, isn't it? Oh, would you wipe that _off_, Ron? You look like a two-year-old," Hermione replied exasperatedly, gaze wavering on the pudding that was now quivering threateningly as it hung off of Ron's chin. Ron's expression turned sour, but he wiped it off successfully before she continued. She looked relieved. "Thank you. As I was saying, it's obvious. For one thing, they're self-proclaimed _ninjas_, and ninjas only come from Japan – and there names: _Naruto Uzumaki_, _Sasuke Uchiha_. There's no doubt that those are Japanese as well."

"Since when have you known what Japanese sounds like?" asked Ron, looking a strange mixture of suspicious and awed all at once.

"Since I read a book on the subject."

"Of _course_," Ron replied, rolling his eyes at her.

She just ignored that comment and continued to eat her own pudding, which was already beginning to look a little under the weather now that she had neglected it for so long.

"_I _didn't even know ninjas still existed," said Ron, finally swallowing an absurd amount of pudding and rescuing them all from the tense silence that could only result from one of Ron and Hermione's spats.

Harry looked over to Hermione, expecting her to fill in the blanks, but all she did was shrug – just as lost as Ron on the subject.

"That one guy _did_ look weird, though, didn't he?" asked Ron, his mouth completely pudding free – much to Hermione's visible relief. "He looked like he had whiskers and he was wearing _all orange_. You'd think, being a ninja like he says he is, he'd be wearing something darker in order to blend into his surroundings."

"You seem to know a lot on the subject," said Harry, giving Ron a sideways glance.

Ron's ears turned a light shade of pink, but his reply was as strong as ever. "Bill had a friend growing up who was obsessed with ninjas. He and Bill would play them all the time in the backyard."

"Oh yeah, I remember that now," piped in Ginny, who had clearly been listening to the entire conversation from Hermione's right. "But that orange one wasn't nearly as compelling as the black-haired one – Sasuke, was it? – there was just something _about_ him."

Ginny's statement ended wistully and, for some reason, both she and Hermione colored a bit and giggled.

Ron's mouth tipped down into a frown and his expression darkened as he watched Hermione's strange antics.

Dean, who sat across from Ginny, didn't look very different from Ron as he watched her with the same perturbed expression. Harry tried to ignore the way his stomach lurched in indignation as Ginny continued to blush.

"He looked like he had a severed duck-butt attached to the back of his head, if you ask me," Ron added, practically glaring at Hermione now – who had finally stopped giggling most uncharacteristically.

"I thought it was _charming_," Ginny said, whipping her long red hair out of her face and smiling at Ron.

"Although," Hermione said, her blush already fading. "He did look a bit dangerous, didn't he? I wouldn't be surprised if he's had the experience of killing a few people."

"True," agreed Ginny, but her grin widened. "Although, that might just make him seem more fanciable – oh, sorry, Dean."

"s'alright," replied Dean, trying to smile back at Ginny who looked genuinely apologetic, but his expression still seemed a bit constipated. Strangely enough, Harry felt a great affinity toward him at that moment.

"Mr. Potter?"

Harry looked up to regard the stern face of Professor McGonagal looming just above and behind him. Everyone on the table was watching her too, and their conversation had been completely silenced as they glanced from her to Harry in interest.

"Yes, Professor?" Harry couldn't understand why his head of house would want him already. It was still only the beginning of term feast, after all. That is unless, something weighty and uncomfortable dropped down into his pudding-filled stomach, something really bad happened.

"No need to worry, Potter," Professor McGonagal assured him curtly, obviously she had been able to read the dawning fear in his expression. "The Head Master would just like you to come down to his office."

……………………………………………………………………

When Harry followed McGonagal into the familiar office, he immediately noticed the two _ninjas_ who had caused such a stir earlier, sitting in two plush chairs that Dumbledore had most likely conjured up and looking back at him with equal expressions of interest.

Harry stepped further into the room and glanced from one boy to the other – noticing that they both looked around his age, which slightly surprised him considering he barely got a good look at them before in the Great Hall. The blond one was watching him with a befuddled and curious expression, but the black-haired one (Harry noticed the duck-butt, but tried not to ponder that too much) was staring back at him stonily, and almost appraisingly.

"Welcome, Harry." Dumbledore smiled genially at him and motioned him forward, before taking out his wand and conjuring another chair beside the black-haired ninja, who Harry was already beginning to feel wary of. He already couldn't understand what Hermione and Ginny saw in him, exactly, but he tucked those thoughts away before they bothered him a bit too much.

Harry sank into the chair a bit awkwardly and looked across the desk at Dumbledore. "You wanted me, Professor?"

"Ah! It's him again! Who is this, old man?"

Harry glanced to his right and realized that the blond teen was pointing a finger at him – almost accusingly – except that his expression looked genuinely curious.

"Professor Dumbledore, if you please – and Oh yes, my apologies," Dumbledore began, clearly not perturbed by the blond stranger's rudeness, indicating Harry with his hand. "This is Harry Potter."

"Harry," Dumbledore indicated Naruto and the teenagers beside Harry with the same gesture. "This is Naruto Uzumaki and this is Sasuke Uchiha. I suspect you will all have a lot to learn from each other."

Harry nodded his head at them, but only the one named Naruto nodded back – a huge smile plastered across his face, which was framed by strange whisker-like scars that, coupled with his spikey hair, made him look like some sort of wild animal.

He looked back over at Dumbledore questioningly, not really understanding where the Head Master was going with this, but Dumbledore was already speaking.

"I have invited you here, Harry," Dumbledore began, conjuring another tea cup out of thin air and filling it with hot tea from an equally created kettle – Harry noticed out of the corner of his eye that Naruto was watching the entire process with a deep fascination, which made the teen look more and more like a housecat. The cup clinked softly upon the desk when it was full and the kettle popped out of existance. "To discuss with these fine young men the potential whereabouts of Voldemort – and possibly figure out how to safely return these two back to the land from which they have come."

"They know where Voldemort is?" Harry nearly leapt out of his chair as he regarded Naruto and Sasuke. He already remembered all of the reports of the terrible deaths that had swept the nation over the summer, and he was anxious to find Voldemort and make it all end. He had been afraid of his place in the prophesy at first – it had already been splashed across the _Daily Prophet_ that he was the _Chosen One_, although only three people other than him really knew the details – but now, he had come to accept it and he wanted to prepare.

"Vol- Volde…?" Naruto looked confused when he tried to pronounce the name as though he'd never heard it before – and Harry realized, like Muggles, he probably _had _never heard of the notorious dark wizard before.

"Voldemort, moron."

That was the first time the black-haired teen, Sasuke, had spoken in front of Harry and it slightly surprised Harry how deep his voice was. However, Naruto was glaring at Sasuke now as though the incredibly deep-voiced teen had ruined his life.

Harry began to feel restless in the inexplicable tension, but then Naruto broke it off, looking back at Dumbledore questioningly. "Who is this Vol-demort, anyway?"

"He's a powerful dark wizard who has only just gained his full strength after fifteen years of recuperating in hiding. Now that he's back, none of the wizarding world is safe, except for possibly the wizards who served him called Death Eaters." Harry was surprised that he had been the one to answer the question, as he hadn't meant to usurp Dumbledore at all. He glanced over at Dumbledore apologetically, but Dumbledore didn't seem to mind.

"What are wizards?"

"Erm..." Harry began haltingly, a bit taken aback by the other's lack of knowledge, but after thinking about it for a few seconds he realized it made perfect sense. They were foreign and possibly, non-magical. "People who can do magic."

"Oh, like with those sticks?" Naruto asked, eyeing Harry's wand which was just peaking out from the pocket of his jeans; reminding Harry that he hadn't had a chance to change into his robes yet, due to the extenuating circumstances between Malfoy and him on the train.

"Y-yeah," Harry stuttered, not really knowing how else to explain it when he didn't really understand all the complexities of the issue himself.

"Hm…we don't need sticks for magic," Naruto stated, smiling in a boasting way that wasn't meant to be mean.

Harry's attention perked up disbelievingly. "What do you mean?"

"We can do all sorts of techniques by forming seals with our hands," Naruto replied informatively. "I've never seen anyone use sticks to mold chakra before I came to this place."

Now it was Harry's turn to be confused as the blond boy just smiled at him brightly and Sasuke only surveyed him with that unnervingly blank expression.

Harry seemed to have lost his voice for a second before he coughed. Fawkes, whom he hadn't noticed before, squawked loudly from behind him. "Erm…chakra?"

Naruto gave him a look that was slightly disbelieving, but he answered the question anyway. "Yeah, everyone has it, right? It's the energy that fuels our bodies, but back in the village we learn how to control it and use it for fighting techniques."

"Oh," said Harry, lamely.

Harry supposed that made some logical sense. After all, students at Hogwarts were supposed to be learning how to control their magical powers to use it in techniques as well. Although, the fact that these ninjas didn't have to use wands, and instead, used their hands was a bit disconcerting.

"So, is it true that you know where Voldemort is?" Harry asked – slightly relieved that, unlike everyone else he talked to, these strangers didn't seem to look fazed at all by the mention of _Voldemort_ – and getting back to his most pressing concern before he had gotten so completely sidetracked.

"It is possible," Dumbledore replied, answering for Naruto who looked more than a little confused at the question. "Naruto, if you please, would you tell Harry what you just told me about the circumstances that brought you and your companion to our very door step?"

Harry switched his attention expectantly to the blond and Naruto opened his mouth, but then a loud rumbling sound emanated from his stomach. He scratched the back of his head and chuckled nervously. "Eh…it seems I'm a little hungry."

"Oh, of course," Dumbledore replied, smiling gently at the boy who was now rubbing his growling stomach in embarrassment. "You haven't eaten anything since this morning. I can call down to the kitchens. Do you have a preference in cuisine?"

Naruto seemed to perk up considerably, that uncannily bright smile back on his face. "Do you have Ramen?"

"No, I'm afraid not," Dumbledore replied, and Naruto's blinding smile dropped off of his whiskered face and he visibly slouched in his seat. Dumbledore looked apologetic before he looked over at Sasuke. "Anything you might prefer?"

The stoic boy actually looked thoughtful, slightly dispelling Harry's overall impression that the teen was incapable of human emotions.

"I like tomatos."

If Dumbledore found this answer odd, he didn't show it. Naruto, however, looked over at Sasuke oddly, but the boy didn't react in the least, still watching Dumbledore intently.

"Then I suppose pasta might be best," Dumbledore nodded, swishing his wand and a disembodied voice, that was most unmistakably Dobby's, filled the room. Harry noticed that Naruto barely kept himself on his chair after the boy had jumped into the air, startled as the voice rang in all of their ears.

"Dobby is here, Dumbledore, sir!" Began the overly excited, squeaky voice. "Dobby is most proud to serve you, sir!"

"Thank you, Dobby," Dumbledore answered graciously. "Could you send up some spaghetti with tomato sauce," Dumbledore paused slightly to eye Harry. "Three plates should be adequate."

"Yes, sir!" The voice squeaked back. "Dobby is sending it up right away, sir!"

"Thank you, Dobby," Dumbledore replied and waved his wand to release the spell.

Harry realized that he had missed the main course of the feast. So he was quite grateful for Dumbledore's insight when three plates filled with spaghetti and other assortments of food and accompanied by goblets full of what looked to be pumpkin juice appeared on the desk exactly in front of him, Sasuke, and Naruto.

Naruto looked a little disgusted as he looked at the food, but he smiled at Dumbledore just the same and tentatively dug in.

"Now that that has been taken care of," Dumbledore stated as they all dug into their meals. "I suppose it would be most prudent for Naruto to retell his story, before retiring for the night."

"But Professor," said Harry thickly, barely swallowing around a mouthful of spaghetti. "Where are they going to sleep?"

"Within Gryffindor Tower, I suspect," Dumbledore replied, obviously not missing the way Harry's eyes widened in shock at his words. "I think it's best that you learn from each other until we can fully sort out this inconvenient situation."

Harry stopped eating and sat back in his chair. For some reason, he could already tell this was going to be an exceptionally busy year.

…………………………………………………………………………

AN: For those of you who are particularly astute you may have realized that the very first section of Harry's POV is taken, word for word, from the _Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince_, U.S. addition. This is the only time I am going to do this during this story. I just wanted to bring the real plot of 6th year into the plot of my story. But, from now on, because of Naruto and Sasuke's influence, this year is going to be very different from the year depicted in the canon texts.

Just so you're all aware. Ta-ta for now.

TBC…


	4. The Hidden Past

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Harry Potter. I never _ever_ will. Especially after this.

AN: Thank you for all of your reviews and comments. I appreciate them all. Although, I suppose I should say now that I really enjoy reviews that are longer than the favorite _two-liners_. This isn't to say that I don't exactly enjoy the two-liners, I just _really _enjoy the longer ones.

Thanks…and enjoy.

Sinking Into Sweet Uncertainty

Chapter 3: The Hidden Past

………………………………………………………………………………

_Naruto was sitting in a hospital bed, feeling completely downtrodden as the white curtains on the window beside him fluttered in the breeze. _

_He stared at the object sitting on his sheet-covered lap, pain coursing through him that didn't all have to do with his slowly healing physical injuries. The metal plate of the head band glimmered in the sun rays that entered the room and sharply contrasted with Naruto's dark thoughts. The deep slash which cut through the otherwise clean metal and into the thinly carved symbol beneath was a better example of the roiling emotions currently slashing into his soul. _

_The door clicked open and Naruto looked up to see Sakura smiling at him._

"_Sakura-chan…I…"_

_She walked into the room and stopped at the window where she pulled back the curtains. Fresh sunlight entered the room and glittered in her tellingly misty eyes as she stared out the window at nothing and everything. _

_She smiled, but it looked strained. "It's okay, Naruto…it's a beautiful day…"_

_She turned to smile at him genuinely, and past all of his guilt, he felt a little better._

"_But really, you didn't have to bring that old boot with you." Her expression looked suddenly stern. "It's already gotten you in so much trouble as it is."_

"_What?" Naruto frowned at her confusedly. He had no idea what she was talking about all of a sudden. "I don't have a…"_

_But his words were cut short when he looked back down to his lap and no longer saw the head band that had caused him so much grief, but an old ratty boot instead. There was something increasingly familiar about it and he immediately felt incredibly uneasy. _

_On instict, he grabbed hold of it to fling it off of him, but a terrible sinking feeling assaulted his gut as he realized he couldn't let go and the room around him became steadily steeped in darkness. _

_He looked back up at Sakura, but she was no longer there. The entire room seemed to be sinking into itself, as though it had all become like water and was draining down a hole in the floor. _

_Panicking now, he almost couldn't prepare himself for the jolt he somehow knew was coming, before a sharp force tugged at his navel and he was flung through the air and into a vast, roaring darkness. _

_Right before he was about to hit the ground, he realized with a jolt of horror that there was a huge spider waiting beneath him – its gruesome pincers snapping as it reflected Naruto's progressively clarifying form in its eight milky-white eyes. _

_Naruto tried to change his trajectory in mid-air somehow, but nothing would work. He closed his eyes and braced himself for impact, but something long and muscular had already wrapped around his body._

_Shaking a bit, he looked up to see the largest Snake he had ever seen, looking down at him hungrily – its fangs dripping with venom as its long tongue darted in and out just centimeters from Naruto's face. _

_Naruto wanted to cry out, but no sound came out of his suddenly dry throat – and he thrashed around violently instead. _

"_There's no need to struggle, Naruto. I'm not going to kill you."_

_Naruto stared and the snake's face transformed into that of a pale boy with raven-black bangs framing his face. The boy was smirking slightly, but his obsidian eyes were looking down at Naruto intently._

"_Sasuke…what…?" Naruto realized he was still being held tightly, but now it was by Sasuke's arms as the boy held him uncharacteristically close._

_Sasuke only smirked at him, his face drawing closer._

_Naruto gasped and a weight fell upon his chest so that he could hardly breathe as the pale boy's face descended toward his – a strangely hungry look passing across Sasuke's dark eyes. The weight was getting heavier now as Naruto stopped struggling and looked down at Sasuke's slightly parted lips. _

_So close…_

_Too close…_

_Now the weight was banging into his chest as though something small was bouncing on it. Naruto frowned…that couldn't be right…_

_Suddenly, Sasuke's grip dissolved around him and his face was replaced by a shrunken green head with two buggy eyes staring straight back at him from a mere centimeter distance._

"AUUUUUGGGGHHHHH!"

Something 'eeped' squeakily as Naruto jumped into the air, slightly hampered by a bunch of cloth that was now unraveling around him. He looked around wildly at the alarmingly unfamiliar surroundings, noting how the walls were made of stone with a crimson rug covering the floor and the entire room was bathed in the bluish half light of what looked to be early dawn that filtered in from four tiny windows. He could also hear people behind the strange crimson curtains, which hung around the room, moaning.

"Nnnng…Whazzappening?"

"Harry? Izzat you?"

Two of the curtains were pulled back to reveal two separate boys on beds, staring around the room blearily.

"No, no, it's just Dobby."

Another boy with messy black hair and his glasses slightly askew emerged from behind some curtains to Naruto's right . He immediately stepped toward the foot of Naruto's bed, which Naruto had only just realized he was standing on, and pulled the fallen covers off of something that was currently writhing on the floor.

Once the covers were off, the strange creature Naruto had seen only moments before was now blinking up at him and trembling pitifully – his knobbly little body wrapped in a dirty cloth and both of his feet covered by mismatched socks. Naruto managed to bring his breathing back down under control as he stared down at it in bewilderment.

"Dobby, you really shouldn't wake people up like that," the bespectacled boy chided. "You can kill people that way."

"Dobby is sorry, sir!" The ugly little creature squeaked, looking like he had shrunken a little more under the boy's remarks. "Dobby is only trying to get measurements, sir!"

"Measurements?" The boy looked a bit surprised.

"Yes, sir. For new robes, sir!" the creature squeaked, making to move back toward Naruto.

Naruto stepped away on reflex, which the boy seemed to notice because he pulled the creature back by the scruff of its stained clothing. The creature writhed in the air, as though it was trying to run, but it gave up when it realized belatedly that it had been caught by the bespectacled boy, whom it seemed to respect highly.

"I'm sorry, Naruto," the boy smiled apologetically, now looking straight at him with strikingly emerald eyes. "I don't think Dobby understands the concept of personal space quite yet."

"H-how do you know my name?" Naruto questioned, feeling completely like he had awakened from one dream and had stepped right into another. He surveyed the room again and noticed that four other boys were now looking at him from their beds with similar expressions of shock. "Where am I?"

"You don't remember?" The boy looked up at him incredulously. "You got to Hogwarts yesterday."

For some reason that name, _Hogwarts_, acted as a catalyst that broke Naruto's temporary memory block and all his memories of the previous day flooded back into his subconscious.

He remembered the mission, the forest, the spiders, the squid, the fortress, the old man named Dumbledore, the school called Hogwarts, the boy named Harry Potter. And he remembered this place. The tower that Harry led them to after they ate that gross food, he now knew was called _pasta_, and the two beds Naruto and Sasuke had found waiting for them.

Naruto fell back down onto his bed, which now looked like a tornado had hit it and he looked over at the bespectacled boy with a new sense of recognition.

"Yeah, I remember," he mumbled a bit, but a smile tugged at his mouth – he definitely remembered he had liked the boy almost immediately. "You're Harry."

Harry seemed to look a bit startled at Naruto's statement, but he only smiled a bit as he placed the strange creature back on the floor, saying, "Yeah, I'm Harry."

"And this is Dobby," Harry explained, gesturing to the creature stooped at his feet. "He's a House Elf."

"House Elf?" Naruto questioned, but Harry's reply was interrupted by someone else.

"Whoa! Don't tell me _he's_ living with us now?" The boy who spoke had ginger colored hair and freckles dotted across his pale skin. He was looking between Naruto and Harry with an awestruck and slightly delighted expression.

Naruto hadn't ever met this boy or the three others in the room before. He and Sasuke had followed Harry back to his room at a very late hour the night before, and by then, everyone else had been asleep behind their drawn bed-curtains.

"Well, they're both only staying here until they can find a way back to their home country," Harry explained as the creature he had called Dobby scrambled onto Naruto's bed and was now pulling out what looked to be a tape-measure. "We're going to meet with Dumbledore again to figure it all out."

"TREVOR!"

Just then a small toad jumped out into the middle of the room from one of the beds and a slightly heavy-set boy chased after it. Naruto thought the toad reminded him of Gamakichi, the toad boss's cheeky son, but this toad didn't seem to talk at all as the slightly fumbling boy caught it in his grip and it only let out a loud croak. Maybe toads were different here; _like everything else. _

"Is the other one staying here too?" Another boy with dark skin asked, looking over at an empty bed hopefully. "I didn't see him."

"I don't know," Harry answered, clearly perplexed as he glanced over at Naruto.

Naruto looked over at the bed as well and he suddenly realized that Sasuke _wasn't _there. For some reason, this made him feel very agitated and strange images of Sasuke walking away from him into an cloud of darkness flitted across his mind's eye. He immediately jumped off of his bed, forgetting about the House Elf that had previously been measuring his inseam and flinging the creature into the air before it landed upon the mattress with a squeaky cry and a soft thump.

He had just dashed to the door of the room single-mindedly when he realized that his clothes were lighter than usual and he looked down to see that they weren't his usual clothes at all. He felt his forehead and nothing was there, just skin and his loose bangs. He stopped and looked around frantically for his stuff, but he couldn't see it anywhere.

"Where are my clothes?"

All the boys sent him startled looks, but Harry seemed to consider the question as Naruto jumped around the room in his search with his usual boundless amount of energy.

"Dobby," Harry addressed the House Elf, who was now picking himself up. "What'd you do with his things?"

"Last night, Dobby is taking it down to the wash, sir," He squeaked, now untangling himself from his long roll of measuring tape. "Theys clothing is dirty, sir."

Naruto stopped moving around at that and stared at the House Elf in disbelief.

Harry looked over at him apologetically, before addressing the House Elf once again. "Aren't his clothes done by now? Couldn't you just bring them up? He doesn't really have anything else to wear."

"You should get them, Dobby," said the red haired boy who had gotten up from his bed to stand by Harry. "The bloke can't very well go around wearing pyjamas all day."

"Dobby is sorry, sir," the House Elf squeaked, shaking its bulbous bald head – making his apology look quite sincere. "Dobby is supposed to get Harry Potter's ninja new robes, sir."

"Harry Potter's ninja?" The red-haired boy repeated, looking like he was very much trying to hold back a laugh.

Harry sighed as Naruto looked out of one of the windows in an attempt to find Sasuke, but everything was still too dark to really see anything on the ground. Naruto tensed as the uncomfortable feeling that Sasuke had left him again was beginning to fill him to the brim.

Strange thoughts began to fill his head – _what if Sasuke had found a way back without him? After all, Sasuke had only been back in the village for a month…and who really knew why he had come back? What if this was all his plan in the first place? A plan to finally get rid of Naruto? _Naruto was unable to fully comprehend the absurdity of these thoughts as he began to feel increasingly panicked.

He paced around a bit and came to a silent conclusion as all the boys in the room were focused on the exchange between Harry and Dobby. He really didn't need his clothes anyway.

"When will the robes be – hey!" Harry's question was cut off as Naruto dashed past him and out the door. "Where are you going?"

Naruto ignored the boy's startled voice as he vaulted down the small staircase and dashed across the deserted room at the bottom before he practically jumped through the hole in the wall – which had just managed to open for him. He nearly skidded down the marble staircase leading up to the tower, but he fed chakra unthinkingly into his bare feet as he landed at the bottom and took off through the still-dark passageways of the building.

He ignored the way the paintings he passed seemed to come to life as their eyes followed him groggily and the way the still-lit torches set into the walls made the otherwise dark hallways flicker eerily in orange light. He only focused on one thing and that was Sasuke's distinctive chakra signature – and he couldn't feel it anywhere.

Naruto frowned and put on speed, just missing water bombs that were chucked at him from what looked to be an ugly little man, floating in the hallway. Harry had described ghosts to him and Sasuke the night before, when Naruto had unsurrepticiously walked right through one – not a pleasant experience – so he wasn't bothered very much.

After what seemed like hours of running passed moving pictures, cackling ghosts, clanking armor and all sorts of other strange things that had mostly been a blur, Naruto was now standing just outside the front door and nursing a stitch in his side. He hadn't felt one of those in a long while due to his training, but it seemed that the stress he was under in this place brought out the worst in his abilities. Naruto was eventually able to control his heavy almost rasping breathing and stand up from his crouching position.

That was when he felt it. The slight pull of Sasuke's distinctive chakra called out to him from somewhere in the distance. Naruto squinted into the sun, which was now just beginning to rise over the distant mountains and shed it's light over the slightly misty grounds. He could barely see anything, but that hardly mattered – he could _feel _him.

Naruto broke out into another run, and ran down the cliff that jutted out over the lake, and then, he saw him.

Sasuke was standing under a large beech tree by the calm lake, his back turned toward Naruto and the castle behind. Naruto couldn't help but notice how serene the boy looked, even from the back, as the slight early morning breeze ruffled through his long bangs and fluttering night clothes. He almost looked…_innocent_.

"Sasuke!" Naruto yelled out when he felt he was close enough, just meters away from the beech tree.

Sasuke looked back at him as though he had expected his arrival and Naruto tried not to look too relieved at seeing his face again.

"Sasuke…" he repeated, slightly out of breath as he stopped beside him. "What're you doing here?"

"Thinking," Sasuke replied in his usual deep tones, his eyes once again upon the lake.

Naruto couldn't keep himself from feeling slightly annoyed by the boy's uncaring nature – as though he really didn't think going somewhere without telling Naruto first was okay. Of course, if he had really thought about the matter – which he hadn't – he would have realized this was a very strange thing to think. After all, Naruto and Sasuke had never really made a habit, even before the four year break, of letting each other know where each of them was going to be. Their relationship had never really operated under those terms.

However, as it was, Naruto pushed the irritation out of his mind and looked out across the lake as well, reminding him of the giant pink cephalopod that was surely lurking beneath the surface. He frowned at the thought. "Do you think we'll be able to find a way out of here soon?"

"I don't know," Sasuke replied. "It seems as though that Dumbledore has some information we'll need."

"But he doesn't seem to know that much either," Naruto muttered, remembering the night before in the man's office. "He didn't even know where we are from or how to get there."

"Hn," Sasuke muttered, and there was silence for a long moment between them as they looked off across the lake, which was now glittering under the rising sun. Sasuke picked up where they had left off as though the break had never occurred. "I think there's definitely a connection between Orochimaru and this Voldemort that that boy, Harry Potter, was mentioning. They seem very similar – like-minded almost."

"Yeah, I guess you could say that," Naruto replied, remembering the conversation they had over dinner the night before. "Both of them want more power, both of them want to live forever, both of them are egomaniacs, and both of them have an unhealthy fascination with _snakes_." Naruto smiled at the end of his list. "They're practically _brothers_!"

"Yes." Sasuke's expression remained carefully blank – not even reacting to Naruto's little joke – and Naruto's smile subsequently slid off of his face. "However, they both live in two very separate nations. How could they have met?"

"That is a little weird," Naruto agreed, but a frown still marred his expression due to lingering irritation at Sasuke's inability to smile…_ever_. "No one here even seems to know _what_ Konoha is. Let alone _where_ it is. And it doesn't seem like anyone in Konoha knows about this place either." Then Naruto paused, thinking. "Hey! You don't think Kakashi would know, do you?"

"Not likely." Sasuke finally glanced over at Naruto and Naruto got the distinct impression that Sasuke was looking down on him again.

"But," Naruto interjected – his irritation growing with the black-haired _genius_. "He knew all about the nations outside of the five shinobi ones. He said so himself!"

"That didn't mean he knew what the nations were or any details about them – even how to get to them," Sasuke shot back. "Only that there _were_ places outside of the five shinobi nations."

"Well, that isn't definite, is it?" Naruto growled back, glaring at Sasuke. "We only know that it could be either or. In fact, he could be telling the Hokage everything he knows right now!"

"I still doubt it," Sasuke shook his head, remaining relatively calm, although he looked to be slightly irritated beneath the surface. "Kakashi said that learning about the other nations didn't really matter much because none of them knew about the five shinobi nations and thus, were not a threat. That sounds as though he didn't care much for investigating the foreign nations and collecting data. There probably isn't much he already knows."

Naruto growled a bit under his breath, but he didn't push the subject. What Sasuke said made sense, even though Naruto didn't want to believe it.

Both of them remained shrouded in silence after that – each stuck within their own thoughts about the situation and basking in the warm sunlight that now beat down at them from a lot higher in the sky.

Finally, Naruto couldn't take it anymore.

"Sasuke."

The boy in question glanced at him, a sure sign that he was listening.

Naruto gulped inaudibly, but he knew he just couldn't live with himself if he didn't ask. "Why did you come back?"

And the entire atmosphere changed.

………………………………………………………….

Harry had just gotten back from lunch with Ron and Hermione who all had a free period together on this first day of classes. He still couldn't believe Dumbledore had allowed Snape to finally live his dream and become a professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts, but – despite this development and the detention he still had lined up for the Saturday after next – Harry still felt quite proud about telling Snape off during the lesson.

"_Yes," said Harry stiffly._

"_Yes, _sir._"_

"_There's no need to call me 'sir', Professor."_

Harry grinned at the memory. It almost made everything worth it…_almost_.

Harry followed Ron and Hermione to their usual table by the window in the common room and they all sat down. Hermione had already taken out a book, which she was reading through intently.

"So, have the ninjas returned yet?" Ron asked, trying to look casual, but failing with the way his eyes were darting around the common room – as though an orange jumpsuit would suddenly appear out of nowhere.

"I don't think so," Harry replied, starting to wonder about it himself. Wherever they were, they were most likely still in their pyjamas, because Dobby hadn't come back with their robes yet.

"Those two seem a bit nutters, don't you think?" Ron asked, leaning across the table toward Harry and looking as though he was expressing his expert opinion on the subject. "Especially '_Swirly Fishcake'_. He seems the most manic, if you ask me."

Somehow Harry doubted the two were both _'nutters'_ as Ron had so quaintly put it, but he didn't have a chance to say this to Ron as the portrait hole opened and the two aforementioned ninjas practically _tumbled_ into the room – nearly squashing a couple of first year girls who were on their way out.

"What do you mean, it doesn't matter!" Naruto screamed as he aimed a punch for Sasuke's mouth, which was blocked soundly. Naruto looked frustrated when they both tumbled to a halt right in the middle of the common room, Sasuke pinning him to the ground. "Fucking bastard!"

The entire common room, which was full of milling Gryffindors, went silent and watched as the two battled it out. Hermione had already lowered her book and was watching the events intently. Harry was surprised she wasn't getting up to stop them, being the Prefect that she was – but she just sat there with a thoughtful expression on her face.

"Too slow, moron." Sasuke muttered.

This seemed to have only incensed Naruto further, because the boy immediately growled and bucked the black-haired boy off. Sasuke fell back almost gracefully, as though he had allowed the blond boy to be free of him by a mere whim, before Naruto got up entirely and glared down at him hotly.

"You leave us all behind for _four years_– betraying Sakura-chan, betraying the village, betraying _me_!" Naruto's voice was shaking now, but because of anger or something else – Harry couldn't really tell. "You try to kill me then go off to that snake-bastard and let him use your body AND YOU SAY IT DOESN'T MATTER!"

Sasuke didn't answer, he only stood up and watched the blond intently. Both of their pyjamas were already filthy. Harry supposed they had both already tussled a bit in the grass outside.

"If it didn't matter then…then WHY THE HELL DID YOU COME BACK!" Naruto practically screamed – pure agony ripping at his voice, which seemed to ripple throughout the room. Some younger girls on the couches were already beginning to tear up. "SASUKE!"

Sasuke remained silent, which seemed to only spur the shorter boy on.

"You never cared…you never cared about any of us, did you Sasuke!" Naruto was shaking now, his fists clenched so hard Harry could see the whites of his knuckles. "Sakura waited for you. Even after the first time she never gave up hope! BUT YOU NEVER CAME, DID YOU, SASUKE! We had to go back for you, because she wouldn't allow us to give up on you! Even after you had killed Yamato and Sai!"

Gasps could be heard around the room at this statement.

Now Harry knew Hermione was right with her assessment the night before, Sasuke had killed before.

"Why?" Naruto's eyes were tearing up now. Harry had never seen this much pure emotion on a stranger's face before. Naruto brought in a rattling gasp. "Why did you stop fighting? Why did you…?"

Naruto's voice dropped off and an inexplicable blush colored his already flushed face.

The room was deathly silent as the two boys stared at each other. Then, Sasuke stepped forward. Naruto looked like he wanted to step back but he stood his ground and looked up at Sasuke challengingly.

Sasuke bent his head down toward Naruto's – there noses almost touching – and whispered, just barely audible to everyone else, "I did it because I wanted to."

Everybody watched as the two boys held this position for quite some time, before Sasuke pulled away and walked straight out of the portrait hole. Naruto looked dumbstruck in his wake, but he managed to pull himself together enough to make his own way up to the boy's dormitory and out of sight.

"What the bloody hell was that all about?"

Ron had been the first to speak in the entire room, breaking the heavy silence and invigorating everyone else to discuss what they had just seen.

"It seems like a case of extremely severe unresolved sexual tension," answered Hermione clinically, who was now buried behind her book again.

Ron mouthed the words, 'unresolved sexual tension', silently as he looked at her in shock. He looked over at Harry questioningly, as though trying to confirm what he'd heard, but Harry must have looked just as confused, because he went straight back to staring at Hermione as though a baby dragon was currently hatching on her head.

"What do you mean, _unresolved sexual tension_?" Ron asked carefully, as though he was talking to a mental patient who could spring into attack at any time.

"I mean what it sounds like, _Ron_," Hermione replied, finally looking up from her book to regard him waspishly.

"B-but, _Hermione_," Ron continued, still treating her to his mental-patient voice. "Surely you realize they are both blokes."

"I am aware of that, but thanks for showing so much faith in my intelligence." Hermione looked at him dryly.

"Well, it's just that," Ron began, looking stranded and bewildered as though he suddenly thought Hermione was, indeed, transforming into _Loony_ Luna Lovegood. "Wouldn't that be a little _gay_?"

"Your point?"

"Well," Ron was seriously beginning to look exasperated now, and he was looking to Harry for support, but Harry looked away and pretended he didn't understand Ron's pleading looks. He didn't want to get in the middle of this. _Ever_. Ron continued without him. "Isn't that a bit _unnatural_, Hermione?"

Suddenly, Hermione slammed her book down into the table, which gave Ron and Harry a jolt, and she was now clearly glaring at Ron.

"Oh, _Ron_!" She began exasperatedly. "You don't really think being homosexual is unnatural, do you?"

"And you think it's _natural_, I take it?"

"Of _course_ I do!" Hermione replied harshly, her voice rising a bit – much like it did when she was talking about _spew_. "How could you not?"

Just then a loud pop sounded to Harry's right and he looked down to see Dobby standing there with a pair of folded black robes in his arms. Glad to ignore Ron and Hermione's current argument ("But they have limp wrists!") ("What does _that _have to do with anything?"), Harry bent down to take the robes off of Dobby's hands.

"Dobby is not wanting to give this to them alone, sir," the House Elf squeaked, looking warier than usual.

"I understand, Dobby," Harry replied reassuringly. "I'll leave them on their beds."

"Thank you, Harry Potter, sir! You is still a great Wizard, sir!"

And then Dobby popped out of existance.

Harry got up and left his two squabbling friends behind, intent upon giving at least one of the robes to their owner. He could only hope that Naruto had calmed down enough to accept them.

……………………………………………………………….

AN: Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha!

TBC…


	5. Denial and Doubt

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Harry Potter and any of their friends (and enemies). They belong to Kishimoto Masashi and JK Rowling respectively.

AN: I did it again…I copied some of the _Half-Blood Prince_, American edition for the first part of this chapter. It just fit too well…

And thank you for all of your reviews. They really make me happy and they help inspire me as well.

Sinking Into Sweet Uncertainty

Chapter 4: Denial and Doubt

……………………………………………………………………………

Tsunade hated Mondays.

The stacks of paperwork were always three days strong, having been building up over the weekend, which she used for gambling and sleeping at home instead of on top of said stacks of paperwork. She almost always had a slight hangover from the copious amounts of sake she drank with Jiraiya the night before. And finally, almost every Monday, something went terribly wrong – or at least she would have to find out that something went terribly wrong. One or the other; her bad luck never managed to be picky.

So, she wasn't too surprised when Kakashi came back with only one of his students and proceeded to report that his other two students had gone missing. She wasn't even surprised to find out how it had happened – although she had been sure at the time that the mission would be the lowest B rank she could find. She hadn't wanted to be too patronizing and send them on an C rank, but it was still bordering on that vague line. She had made sure of that. _Well_, she intertwined her hands in front of the lower half of her face as she listened to Kakashi's depressing report, _so much for planning_.

Kakashi finished and Tsunade sighed as she regarded him and the fidgeting Sakura beside him.

"Please, Tsunade-sama," Sakura began, her expression full of worry. "We've only just been reunited."

Tsunade focused on Kakashi. "Do you think they are alive?"

"Yes," Kakashi answered immediately, illustrating his certainty. That was all she needed.

"Do you know where they have gone?"

"No," Kakashi replied, his one visible eye crinkling thoughtfully. "But I think I have some clues."

"Clues?"

"As you know from my report, the laboratory was completely different from what I have seen before – Sasuke as well." Kakashi began. Tsunade nodded. "There were books that contained information written in a different language. I suspect that the nation that produced these books is connected to the rest of the items in the lab as well."

"I see," Tsunade nodded understandingly. "So if we can find out what country produced those items, we may be able to track where that boot took Naruto and Sasuke."

"Affirmative," Kakashi replied. "I will need access to the Hokage databook archives."

"Agreed," Tsunade muttered, getting up from her desk and moving to the door. "Follow me. This is going to take a long time to sort through."

……………………………………………………………………………

Harry felt quite pleased with himself as he sat down at the Gryffindor table for dinner. He had just managed to win Slughorn's prize in their first course this term of Potions.

Harry could tell Hermione was frustrated with his sudden _luck _in one of his worst subjects, but only Harry knew that it hadn't been luck at all. It had been entirely due to the help of that potions book Slughorn had lent him from the dungeon room cubbard – and the nearly incomprehensible scribblings of its previous owner.

He decided it was probably safe now to tell Hermione and Ron the truth. Hermione's face, however, became stonier with every word he muttered.

"I s'pose you think I cheated?" he finished, aggravated by her expression.

"Well, it wasn't exactly your own work, was it?" she said stiffly.

"He only followed different instructions to ours," said Ron. "Could've been a catastrophe, couldn't it? But he took a risk and it paid off." He heaved a sigh. "Slughorn could've handed me that book, but no, I get the one no one's ever written on. _Puked_ on, by the look of page fifty-two, but…"

"Hang on," said a voice close to Harry's left ear and he caught a sudden waft of that flowery smell he had picked up in Slughorn's dungeon. He looked around and saw that Ginny had joined them. "Did I hear right? You've been taking orders from something someone wrote in a book?"

She looked alarmed and angry. Harry knew what was on her mind at once.

"It's nothing," he said reassuringly, lowering his voice. "It's not like, you know, Riddle's diary. It's just an old textbook someone's scribbled on."

"But you're doing what it says?"

"I just tried a few of the tips written in the margins, honestly, Ginny, there's nothing funny…"

"Ginny's got a point," said Hermione, perking up at once. "We ought to check that there's nothing odd about it. I mean, all these funny instructions, who knows?"

"Hey!" said Harry indignantly, as she pulled his copy of _Advanced Potion-Making _out of his bag and raised her wand.

"_Specialis Revelio!_" she said, rapping it smartly on the front cover.

Nothing whatsoever happened. The book simply lay there, looking old and dirty and dog-eared.

"Finished?" said Harry irritably. "Or d'you want to wait and see if it does backflips?"

"It seems all right," said Hermione, still staring at the book suspiciously. "I mean, it really does seem to be…just a textbook."

"Good. Then I'll have it back," said Harry, snatching it off the table, but it slipped from his hand and landed open on the floor.

Nobody else was looking. Harry bent low to retrieve the book, and as he did so, he saw something scribbled along the bottom of the back cover in the same small, cramped handwriting as the instructions that had won him his bottle of Felix Felicis, now safely hidden inside a pair of socks in his trunk upstairs.

_This Book is the Property of the Half-Blood Prince._

Harry looked around once again to make sure no one was looking before he snapped the book shut and slid it into his bag.

Once he sat back up properly, he noticed that everyone at the table was already staring at a spot behind him. Harry turned around just in time to see a slightly wind-swept Naruto walk into the Great Hall with a cautious expression painted across his whiskered face.

The boy looked a bit different now that he was in the Hogwarts robes Harry had given him during his break period. The black of the robes offset the bright yellow of his hair like night and day – sort of like Malfoy's, but Naruto's skin wasn't nearly as pale and sickly looking.

When Harry had come up with the robes given him by Dobby, Naruto had quite unsurprisingly been sulking in the boy's dorm, sitting on his bed with an extremely forlorn expression as he hung his head between his knees. Harry had approached him cautiously, not wanting to startle him, but Naruto had almost immediately jumped the moment Harry had taken a step past the threshold of the door.

The change was almost instant – Naruto's frown had turned into a bright smile as he scratched the back of his blond head, looking embarrassed. Harry had been able to tell that the transformation was completely fake, but he didn't comment as he handed the robes to Naruto and left him to put them on.

The next chance Harry had to see Naruto in his new robes was right after Potions, but Naruto wasn't there when he had gone back up to the boy's dorm. He had wanted to invite Naruto to dinner in the Great Hall, because he had suspected Naruto probably hadn't eaten yet that day. Harry had wondered about the boy's absence, but he had figured Naruto might not have wanted to eat around a lot of people after what had happened in the Gryffindor common room.

He still didn't know what had become of Sasuke, but Harry was much less inclined to invite him to do anything. There was something about that dark-haired teen that didn't sit right with him – and it didn't all have to do with the fact that Sasuke was apparently a murderer. Naruto seemed to harbor the same sorts of feelings, because the boy didn't seem all that happy with Sasuke's presence either.

Harry wondered whether Dumbledore was aware, as he tended to be about most things, how dangerous Sasuke could be. Surely he wouldn't have allowed the ninja to stay so close to Harry if he had suspected anything? Although Dumbledore still trusted wizards like Snape and Harry couldn't understand that at all.

Harry frowned at these unsettling thoughts, but Naruto soon sat down next to him and smiled at him in a friendly way.

………………………………………………………………

Naruto tried to ignore the stares he was getting from all around the room as he sat down next to the only face he really recognized. His stomach was already grumbling and he smiled at Harry, who looked a bit troubled by something before smiling back.

Once again, lit candles were hanging suspended in the air above the tables and the dark evening sky projected itself through the ceiling. Everyone else at the table was watching them, but Harry looked completely oblivious except for the way he suddenly shoveled more food – or what seemed to be food as everyone else on the table was eating it – from a bowl in front of him onto his plate.

"Where've you been?" Harry asked curiously. "I came back from Potions and you weren't in Gryffindor Tower."

"Oh, I decided to explore a little," Naruto replied sheepishly. "I guess I just didn't realize how long it would take, and I still don't think I've seen all of this place."

He had needed to unwind a bit after the day's events. In truth, he had been running through the corridors and outside the entire time, because he knew exercise was his most effective distraction. He couldn't stand just sitting there in that small room where all he could think about was that painful argument. Besides, he didn't think he would bump into the bastard anywhere. Sasuke was always good at avoiding people when he wanted to. Naruto's fingers clenched, but he pushed the thoughts away. He didn't want to think about any of it anymore. Obviously, Sasuke had better things to do anyway.

"The robes look good on you. Do they fit all right?"

Naruto's attention swiveled to the girl who just spoke to him. She was smiling at him in a strangely encouraging way, beneath kind brown eyes and a mop of bushy mousy-brown hair.

"Yeah." Naruto nodded with a smile, never one to pass up talking to a stranger. "They're just a little itchy and the pants aren't as stretchy as my old ones and I really like orange more than black and it feels weird not to have my weapons pouch and my forehead protector, but…"

"Oh sorry," Harry interjected as Naruto began to ramble, gesturing toward the girl across the table. "Naruto, this is my friend Hermione Granger."

Hermione held out her hand and Naruto took it, a bit surprised when she shook them, because he had never shaken hands back in Konoha – the greeting there only consisted of grabbing each other's hands before pulling away.

"And this is my other friend, Ron Weasely," Harry added, gesturing toward the ginger-haired boy Naruto vaguely remembered from that morning in the boy's dorm. "I don't think you've ever been properly introduced."

Naruto offered his hand to Ron, but the boy hesitated – looking at Naruto oddly – before finally taking his hand and squeezing it abnormally hard. Ron pulled away with a thoughtful expression on his face – one that made Naruto feel inexplicably wary.

"I think you're wrong, Hermione," Ron said, looking over at the girl with a knowing expression. "His wrists aren't limp at all, and his grip isn't too shoddy either."

"Huh…?" Naruto blurted, looking down at his hand and wrists for something abnormal. He couldn't see anything strange about them.

"_Ron!_" Hermione looked affronted as though Ron had personally wronged her, but Naruto couldn't really understand why. She looked over at Naruto apologetically, but for what Naruto wasn't quite sure, before she turned her attention back to Ron and continued in an exasperated tone "That doesn't prove anything."

"Want some mince pie?" Harry muttered beside him, holding out a spoon full of a chunky something as he ignored his squabbling friends.

Naruto's stomach growled. "Sure."

Even though the food looked entirely inedible, he didn't think he could go much longer without it. He had already burned off a lot of his chakra from all the running around and arguing he did that day.

Harry shoveled some of the food onto Naruto's plate, and Naruto picked up his spoon and took a taste. The chunks mulled around in his mouth and around his tongue before he finally swallowed. Surprisingly, it wasn't that bad. It tasted a little like yakiniku. He took another bite and soon he was gobbling it down heartily.

"I'm just saying you're wrong, Hermione." Ron's voice was louder now as the argument picked up steam. "Trust me, it's male intuition."

"Oh?" Hermione shot back, eyeing Ron disbelievingly. "Male intuition, is it? Since when have you ever been able to see what was going on past your own nose?"

Ron looked like he had been slapped in the face and his ears turned red.

"Fine, you don't believe me?" Ron asked, all levity in his voice gone. He switched his attention toward Naruto and Naruto placed his spoon down onto his empty plate with a soft clink and wiped his mouth on his robe sleeve.

"Naruto, tell Hermione she's got it all wrong. You and that Sasuke bloke aren't…" Ron suddenly looked a bit flustered and his ears became even redder – Naruto felt confused, but there was an odd nagging feeling pushing at the back of his thoughts that told him he was not going to enjoy this line of questioning. "Well, you two aren't – you know…"

Ron moved his hands together as though he was attempting to finish the sentence in sign language, but Naruto still didn't understand any of it.

"What?" Naruto asked, suddenly feeling inexplicably wary.

"_Ron!_" Hermione interrupted heatedly. She was fuming, but Ron ignored her.

Ron seemed to take in all of his courage as he took in a long breath, when he let it out his expression was dead serious. "Tell Hermione you and Sasuke don't fancy each other."

"Fancy each oth…?" Naruto's voice trailed off as the meaning behind the words finally sank in and he coughed as his face heated so much that he must have looked like a tomato.

"Completely tactless," Hermione muttered, now glaring at Ron as Naruto's brain seemed to have taken that inopportune moment to break down entirely.

Naruto was buried in a panic as Ron and Harry watched him. His eyes flickered from the two of them as he struggled to keep his face completely blush free, but he knew he was already failing miserably. Terrible thoughts began to cross his mind.

They didn't know about what Sasuke did to Naruto back at Orochimaru's did they? No, how could they? Only Naruto and Sasuke knew and there was no way that Sasuke would have told anyone here or in Konoha. Sasuke didn't have any friends after all.

But of course, Naruto didn't like Sasuke like _that_. Sasuke was the one who had started it and then Naruto just hadn't been able to stop it. It's not like he had wanted to…or anything.

_No_, Naruto thought defiantly. He definitely hadn't wanted that. It had made him feel confused and awkward and distressed.

He hadn't expected Sasuke to do it and afterwards he had just felt incredibly uncomfortable. From that day on he had done his best to ignore and avoid Sasuke and neither of them had spoken about it. He had just wanted to forget all about it and go on without having to think on it.

But then they had that argument earlier that day and it blew up in his face all over again. Naruto hadn't realized he had broached the subject until he was already halfway into repeating the incident out loud. That had been too close for comfort, but Sasuke had understood exactly what Naruto had meant – and that had been the most unsettling.

"_I did it because I wanted to."_

Naruto frowned as his unwanted blush grew even more at the memory. _What was wrong with him? _

Ever since that incident, Naruto just couldn't stop thinking about it. No matter how much he had tried. He had even tried to think about Sakura instead, but that tactic hadn't worked as well as he had hoped it would. Sasuke would just enter his mind on his own and bring along all of the emotional baggage Naruto had been trying to suppress since Sasuke had left him for the second time. Overall, thinking about anything related to Sasuke was just painful and confused – and Naruto just needed to get away from it.

And if Sasuke hadn't told anyone about it and Naruto hadn't either – Naruto's stomach began to feel tight and heavy – then maybe it was really obvious that something had gone on between them. Enough to make even complete strangers suspect something. Then wouldn't Sakura and Kakashi – intelligent ninja who already knew Naruto and Sasuke like family – have already suspected something as well?

"Naruto…you all right?"

Naruto started at Harry's questioning voice and focused on the boy as his green bespectacled eyes watched him closely.

"No…I mean, yeah…I'm fine," Naruto replied, laughing nervously in a desperate attempt to mask his discomfort. He stood up from his seat. He barely looked at any of them, but he made sure to keep a large smile on his face and his voice light. "I think I'm full now. See ya!"

Without waiting for a reply, Naruto raced out of the room and his forced smile slid off of his face.

…………………………………………………………………………..

"Brilliant, Ron. Just brilliant," Hermione stated sarcastically as Ron looked at the doors to the Great Hall with a dumbfounded expression. "You've just managed to single handedly make everything worse."

Harry just sighed as he scooped some newly materialized pudding into his bowl. He had no idea Ron and Hermione's rows would be so prolific this year.

"He didn't answer my question," muttered Ron, looking a bit put-out.

"Well, of course he didn't answer your question," Hermione sighed frustratedly. "He doesn't even know the answer himself."

"What'd my brother do this time?" Ginny piped in interestedly, having finished her conversation with Dean who had sat down in between her and Harry only moments after she had sat down at the table.

"Oh nothing," Hermione replied with a forced air about her. "He only ruined a budding romance through his complete lack of tact."

"You don't say," Ginny stated dryly as she regarded Ron with a cool expression. "Who's relationship did you destroy today, Ronniekins?"

"Relationship?" Ron repeated, appalled and obviously more than a little stung by Ginny's choice to use Fred and George's nickname for him. "What relationship? He didn't say anything!"

"He didn't need to say anything," Hermione bit back. "It was practically written all over his face."

"Oh?" Ron replied disbelievingly – still stubbornly stuck to the idea that he must still be right. "And what else can you tell from looking at his face?"

Hermione looked thoughtful for a moment before replying, keeping her voice measured as though she was reading from right out of a text book. "Well, right after you so diplomatically popped the question, he looked sad and confused at the same time – which shows that he and Sasuke have a very complicated past and emotional interactions between them have generally been tense. He isn't quite sure how to interact with Sasuke and this confuses him and might even make him feel uncomfortable around the other ninja.

"His blush shows that he obviously does harbor some feelings for Sasuke, but that he still either denies them or doubts them, or both. Either way, something has happened between them that has greatly troubled him up until this point and will probably continue to trouble him before he can work things out with Sasuke himself.

"And you've just made this all a lot harder for the both of them."

"Oh, so it's between the two ninja?" Ginny asked as Hermione glared reproachfully at Ron. "I've been thinking there was something going on with them ever since I heard from Katie Bell about their fight in the common room. Katie suspects something as well."

Dean was looking at Ginny in much the same way Ron was after her statement – with an expression of disbelief and slight uneasiness.

"Yes, well I'm sure every witness with at least half a brain has been able to piece two and two together," Hermione replied, her expression softening a bit as she spoke to Ginny. "I just hope the quarter-brained one hasn't ruined it."

Ron nearly flinched at the severe look Hermione shot him, but he didn't say anything.

"Well," added Ginny, looking thoughtful. "You could still spike one of their goblets with love potion – just like the type Fred and George showed us at _Weasley's Wizard Wheezes_."

"Hm..." Hermione put a hand to her mouth in thought. "No, I don't think that'll work. The potion would wear off and the old issues could just get in the way again."

"Maybe all they need is a push in the right direction," Ginny stated with a devious smile.

Ron scowled. "That's it. You're all cracked. At least Harry still agrees with me."

Harry couldn't help feeling alarmed that Ron had picked a side for him – let alone brought him into the debate in the first place.

"That's nonsense," Hermione stated knowledgeably. "He doesn't even have an opinion."

"You're reading that from his face, I take it?" scowled Ron. "Why don't you just let Harry say what he thinks."

Everyone – including Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and Dean – looked at Harry expectantly and Harry stayed silent until he lost all hope that he could bask in the safety of the sidelines.

He sighed. "Erm…I don't really know, but I suppose they could fancy each other." He ignored Ron's huff of indignation. "I mean, the argument was pretty heated and Naruto had blushed a lot."

"Fine," Ron muttered darkly before stuffing his first spoonful of pudding into his mouth. "I see how it is."

Harry felt annoyed by Ron's reaction, but he couldn't feel surprised by it. He had stayed out of the row precisely because he had expected it would happen.

"Well, at least we all know that Harry has some sense unlike a certain _someone_," Ginny said, watching the sulking Ron disapprovingly.

For some reason, Harry felt a lot better after Ginny's vote of approval and he tore into his pudding with new gusto – ignoring Ron's angry muttering completely.

Someone tapped him on the shoulder and he looked over to see a first year Gryffindor boy he just barely recognized.

"H-harry Potter," the boy squeaked, looking up at him and holding out a piece of parchment. "I was told to give this to you."

Harry nodded and took it and the boy scurried away down the table.

He broke the seal and read it.

_Dear Harry,_

_I would like to start our private lessons this Tuesday. _

_Kindly come along to my office at 8 P.M. Please take care_

_to invite Naruto and Sasuke as well. I hope you are enjoying_

_your first day back at school._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Albus Dumbledore_

_P.S. I enjoy Acid Pops_

…………………………………………………………………………………..

Naruto finally got tired of wandering the corridors when he had to dodge the caretaker Argus Filch's cat, whom Harry had warned him and Sasuke about the night before. So, he decided to just go back up to the tower and sleep. He was more than a little exhausted anyway, which was another first for him.

He got to the fat lady in the picture and vaguely remembered the password, which actually made him chuckle a little. "Naughty ninjas."

After the portrait hole swung open, he walked through the common room, which was full of students who all stopped their activities to stare at him as he passed. He wondered how long that would keep up, but he guessed that the very public argument he had had with Sasuke hadn't helped matters any.

Naruto sighed as he climbed the stairs up to the boy's dormitory. If he was lucky, he wouldn't have to face Sasuke at all for the rest of the day.

But of course, Naruto wasn't lucky, at least not recently – and when he opened the door, Sasuke was standing right in the middle of the lamp-lit room, half-naked.

Naruto stopped and stared as Sasuke turned toward him at that very moment, holding the Hogwarts uniform shirt in one hand and zipping his pants up with the other.

Naruto looked away, not knowing what to do and suddenly feeling very out of place – but he decided against running away. He really just wanted to sleep and he was tired of running – he had been doing that all day.

Sasuke watched him as he stepped into the room and moved past Sasuke to his bed. He looked out the window as Sasuke put the shirt on with the sound of a soft rustle against his pale skin.

Naruto looked over to the bed where the golden lamp light didn't reach, which was glowing in a small patch of moonlight from the small window instead, and saw a folded set of pyjamas sitting on the covers. That House Elf, Dobby, must have cleaned his old set.

Naruto kept his eyes away from Sasuke and pulled his robes off followed by his shirt, which he quickly replaced with the pyjama top – and then followed the same procedure with his pants. He could feel Sasuke's eyes on him the whole time, but instead of making him feel entirely uncomfortable, he also felt something else tingling his skin that he didn't want to examine too closely.

"You looked good in those robes."

Naruto looked back at Sasuke, who was now fully dressed in his own robes and watching Naruto with his usual blank expression.

"They're itchy." Naruto felt like that was a stupid reply, but he didn't really know what else to say, and he wasn't really the type to stay silent – no matter how much he should have.

Sasuke looked down at his own robes and then felt the material of the sleeves between his thumb and forefinger. "I think it's because they're made of heavy fabric with a low thread count."

Naruto stared at Sasuke and Sasuke just stared back at him with an almost comically serious expression. Naruto suddenly felt very odd discussing clothing with Sasuke – like it was the most natural thing in the world – especially with everything that had passed between them that day. It was just so absurd.

Naruto couldn't help the laugh that bubbled up his throat and escaped through his mouth before he could clamp it shut and turn it into a strange half-snort.

"I-I didn't know you knew so much about fabric," Naruto chuckled, the strange happiness failing to leave him. Maybe this place _was_ making him crazy.

Sasuke's eyebrow twitched as though he was annoyed by Naruto's glee at his expense, but his reply was just as monotonous as usual. "I know more than you think."

"Don't tell me you know about make-up too?" Naruto teased, easily falling back to his usual jokes.

Sasuke remained silent.

"You're kidding me." Naruto's voice dropped off in awe and a devious smile grew on his face.

"Nothing girly," Sasuke stated, his voice giving away some of his irritation at Naruto's insinuations. "I just had to wear it in preparation for becoming Orochimaru's vessal."

Naruto's smile dropped off of his expression and the happiness sapped out of him in one fell swoop. He stared at Sasuke for a bit, the other boy's expression completely emotionless. Sasuke obviously felt nothing about what he had almost done. The life he had almost lost.

Naruto turned away toward the moonlight and his bed. His voice was soft when he muttered, "I'm going to bed."

He could feel Sasuke's eyes on him as he got into his bed and faced toward the window, but the other boy never spoke again.

It was still early for bed and Naruto knew the other boys wouldn't be up for another hour or two. So, it was just him and Sasuke until then.

Moments later, a rustling of fabric signalled that Sasuke was changing once again and getting into his own bed with a soft creak. Naruto tried his best to forget that the other boy was there, but he didn't fall asleep until Sasuke went completely still and his breathing evened out into soft exhalations.

…………………………………………………………………

AN: Sorry for the long wait for this chapter. This might become the norm because I have gotten a job that pays well, but is also full-time. Thus, the weekend is the only time open to me.

Until next time.

TBC…


	6. The Gulf Between

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Harry Potter, and I never will.

AN: thank you for all of your feedback – and I suppose I'll use this opportunity to reiterate that I simply _love _reviews that are longer than two lines. Hehe.

Sinking Into Sweet Uncertainty

Chapter 5: The Gulf Between

…………………………………………………………………………..

Sakura huffed to herself as she paged through the massive tombs under a small bright lamp in the Hokage Archives Room. She and Kakashi had been scanning through the archives for hours now and neither of them had seen one shred of evidence leading to a foreign nation with the same characteristic language as the one those books in Orochimaru's abandoned lab were written in.

She had already paged through mission reports dating back to the first Hokage up through the fourth, and none of the reports even touched upon foreign relations outside of the five shinobi nations. The closest reported incident she could find involved a Konoha Anbu force retrieving suspicious scrolls on an assassination mission, which they later found, instead of being written in a foreign language, were written in mirror-image kanji.

Sakura leaned back from the desk she was sitting at and rubbed her tired eyes. She just couldn't understand how, in all the years of Konoha's existence, no ninja had ever acquired information on foreign lands. Foreigners may have not been an immediate threat, but of course this situation was enough to prove that their lack of research had been more than a little careless.

She stretched and looked over to see Kakashi scanning his own stack of manuscripts intently. He wasn't nearly as transparent as she tended to be, but she could still tell he was getting frustrated with the lack of leads.

Sitting in the silent windowless Hokage archive room in the basement of the Hokage Tower with these types of troubled thoughts, Sakura began to wonder how Naruto and Sasuke were fairing – wherever they were. She refused to think that they could have died. She knew better than anyone how resilient the two boys were. That is, if they weren't already trying to kill each other.

Sakura sighed as she rolled her eyes. She had no idea why, but Naruto and Sasuke had been behaving strangely ever since Sasuke had come back with them approximately a month ago. That is, stranger than usual.

Now, she wasn't completely unrealistic. She knew it would be tough for all of them to move on after what Sasuke had done, but there was just something more than a little off about how the two boys acted around each other on the way home. Naruto was completely silent, which just didn't suit him – and Sasuke was…well, Sasuke was more quiet and withdrawn than he ever used to be even on his worst days.

Sakura would like to think she had developed a sort of sixth sense when it came to Sasuke. After all, she had spent years stalking him and interpreting his every move; his every expression. And she could tell as she watched him from the corner of her eye as they traveled back; he was brooding about something – his mouth in an almost constant frown. It was subtle, but for Sasuke to have looked that way – that meant something, because he was usually very good at hiding his feelings from view.

And Naruto just ignored him. He hardly smiled, and when he did his eyes still looked nervous and unsure. That was the most unsettling for her.

In Sasuke's absence, she had gotten to know Naruto very well – to the point that she could safely proclaim him her best friend; her most important comrade. She had been with him through many of his struggles; she had felt his pain and his loss each time something went wrong.

Naruto had cried many times in her presence – once for Gaara and another time for Sasuke – but he had never given up; he had never surrendered. He had bounced back every time and the light of his smile always gave Sakura confidence when she had felt none on her own.

So, when that same bright smile never crossed his face after Sasuke's retrieval, Sakura had gotten worried. She was beginning to think that there was something she didn't know about the events at Orochimaru's. There was something that had happened that she was not aware of and maybe even Kakashi shared in her ignorance.

Everything about that mission seemed to click into place, except for Naruto's strange despondency afterward. Sasuke had killed Sai and Yamato out of self-defense. Sakura knew this to the very core of her being. No matter how lost he had become to them, Sasuke was still a Konoha shinobi with bonds to the village that he could not sever completely.

After that, Sasuke had run away and Naruto had left after him, leaving Orochimaru and Kabuto to Kakashi and herself. Only minutes had passed, before Jiraiya had shown up unexpectedly to help. In the end, Kabuto was dead and Orochimaru had managed to escape, severely wounded. It had only been a matter of time before she, Kakashi, and Jiraiya had found Sasuke and Naruto in the underground fortress – along with Uchiha Itachi's dead body.

This had been a completely unexpected development in her view, but Jiraiya had explained that he'd come precisely because he'd been tracking Itachi's movements. She'd known that Itachi and the Akatsuki had been after the Kyuubi within Naruto. After all, she had fought one of them only months before over the fate of Sabaku no Gaara. Still, it was a bit of a shock to see that Itachi had been killed in such a hectic situation and during a mission that had nothing to do with the Akatsuki – bar Orochimaru's distant relationship with said organization in the past.

Both Naruto and Sasuke had remained close-lipped on the details. Naruto had looked exhausted and dazed – his expression unreadable as he breathed harshly in his sitting position against a jagged wall. Sakura had immediately checked on his vitals, scanning him for any internal injuries through the health of his chakra. All the while, she had felt Sasuke watching as she handled Naruto, but she had not looked back to see his expression. Naruto had remained eerily silent during the check-up – looking off at the space just over her shoulder - but she'd been able to determine that his chakra flow was healthy; no disruptions and no damaged pressure points.

Jiraiya had managed to question Sasuke about what had happened, and Sakura had only learned later that Sasuke had been the one to kill his brother. She never learned the details, however. Both Sasuke and Naruto wouldn't talk about it to her – and she hadn't pressed them.

In the end, she was fine with settling for Sasuke's return. He no longer needed to work with Orochimaru, because his vengeance had been carried through. He no longer had a reason to allude Konoha – and although seeing Sasuke again had brought back all the discomfort and heartbreak she had felt at his departure, she had still been able to feel happy for him.

It had taken a month for her and Kakashi to appeal to Tsunade for Sasuke's reinstatement into Team 7. Naruto had been nowhere to be found. So they had gone on arguing Sasuke's case without him. Eventually, the Godaime had relented under the precepts that Sasuke be watched at all times and only allowed on low-rank missions until further deliberation.

And now, just as soon as the team had been reunited for the first time in about four years, Naruto and Sasuke had gone missing – possibly lost in a land no one in the five shinobi nations knew anything about; except maybe Orochimaru.

Sakura suddenly perked up, chiding herself for not noticing this detail, before she turned toward Kakashi who was still buried in a book.

"Kakashi-sensei, have you found anything?" Sakura asked, her high voice awkwardly breaking the silence.

Kakashi turned his one visible eye toward her after quickly scanning the rest of a page, shaking his head. "Not so far."

"Me neither," Sakura responded, closing the book she had spread open across her desk. "I've been thinking…"

Kakashi cocked his head a bit to let her know he was listening.

"Well," she began, suddenly feeling both excited and stupid that she hadn't thought of this sooner. "I think our only chance is to find Orochimaru and interrogate him. After all, he's the one with the abandoned lab full of these foreign objects and books. He must be the only one in the five nations who knows about where they came from."

Kakashi only nodded his head as he picked up another book from his shortening stack. "Yep, that was going to be plan B."

"Oh." Sakura deflated. Of course Kakashi had already thought the situation through farther than she had. Well, it _was _a pretty obvious lead now that she had thought about it.

She sighed and reopened her book. She really doubted she'd find anything more in these archives, but they at least had to try. Although, somehow she knew capturing Orochimaru would be the key to all of this.

_Just wait a little longer Naruto…Sasuke…_

…………………………………………………………………….

Naruto started awake, memories of his latest dream – involving a weasel, a fox, and a snake – receded slowly from his mind as he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes.

He looked around blearily and noticed that Sasuke's bed was empty once again, the covers neat and every corner perfectly pressed – like no one had ever slept there. He tried to ignore the way his stomach fluttered in anxiety at the sight and he sat up to realize that he was, indeed, completely alone in the room. Everyone must have already gotten up and gone down to breakfast.

Shaking his head in befuddlement as light from the window nearest his bed played with his golden hair, Naruto noticed the tell-tale orange of his old clothing in a stack by his bed. He grinned a bit at the sight, relieved that he could finally wear his more comfortable, less itchy clothing. Plus, he never thought black was 'loud' enough for him.

The room was eerily silent as he got up and stretched out his tired muscles – his neck and shoulder muscles were especially tight. Not surprising, since this situation had turned out more stressful than he thought any normal mission could ever be.

Suddenly, there was a hard tap-tap-tap on one of the windows and Naruto looked over to see an owl pecking at the pane-glass – like it wanted to come in. Naruto opened the window cautiously and the bird flew into the room, circling it once before perching upon his bed post. The brown owl watched him expectantly and Naruto looked down at its leg to see a piece of parchment attached to it. He was strongly reminded of the messenger falcons in Konoha that were used to give special warnings from one village to the next, which sent him into a strange nervous hope.

What if this owl was from Konoha?

He jumped for the bird in his excitement, which sent the owl squawking and flapping around in alarm, but he managed to pull the parchment off before the owl flew back out the window in fear.

His hands shook as he unrolled the paper, only for his good feelings to dash away as he read the message.

_Naruto Uzumaki –_

_I hope your stay here has been pleasant so far. I wish for you and Sasuke to meet with me tonight to continue our discussion on your predicament. Harry will be there as well._

_Please allow him to show you the way and come at 9:00 PM._

_Wishing you well,_

_Albus Dumbledore_

Naruto sighed and placed the missive on his bed. He was stupid to think Kakashi and Sakura had been able to find him so soon. At least this meeting with the old man will give him a chance to try and work out how to get back on his own.

Shrugging, he pulled off his pyjama bottoms and top as he yawned hugely. He stepped into his orange pants, secretly delighting in the familiar feel of the cloth as it brushed against his legs and he pulled them up, hopping from one foot to the other. He followed with his dark blue shirt and jacket, zipping the jacket up with much the same feeling of relief.

It was amazing how different and how much lighter he felt wearing his old outfit. He smiled at himself in the full-length mirror. Everything was different here – from the food to the language – but this outfit was the same; it was perfectly familiar. Even if he wasn't back in Konoha yet, this would be enough for now. After all, this outfit was him in every way – bright, loud, flexible, and porous.

Well, maybe that last one only described the clothing, but they really did belong on him.

Of course, if he really thought about it, things hadn't really been familiar since before he got stuck in this strange place; since Sasuke had decided to come back to Konoha.

Naruto's smile faded away as he looked into the mirror.

No, nothing had felt the same after that.

Naruto fingered the cold steel of his forehead protector, the light from the windows gleaming off of its shining surface and hitting his face every once and a while. He hadn't been able to find his weapon's pouch in the pile, but he supposed he wouldn't need it here. Everything was changing so fast.

Naruto sighed uncharacteristically. He thought it was strange that he had slept in this morning, he used to be the ultimate morning person, after all – but in truth he had been that way since he had gotten back to Konoha just a month ago.

During that entire month, he'd started waking up right before lunch-time and never earlier than that. He had thought maybe he was just under a lot of stress from the recent events. So he had taken to training out in the forest until he'd literally collapse. That usually worked out anything that may have been bothering him, but it hadn't helped. He would still wake up late every morning, dash to Ichiraku's and make sure that no one would see him, and then run back into the forest to train his troubles away. It'd never worked and, if anything, it had just made him feel more run-down by the next day – which no form of training had ever done to him before.

He'd begun to wonder whether the fox had something to do it. If it'd suddenly decided that it wouldn't give Naruto the extra boost he was used to just to make Naruto suffer. If that was the case, Naruto thought he might know why. The fox had been bitter since Naruto had refused to rely on its chakra – and now the demon was acting like a petulant child, refusing Naruto its stamina when Naruto was clearly hard-up for his own.

Well, Naruto sure as hell wasn't going to give the fox any satisfaction. So he never pushed the issue and just trained at his normal pace, knowing that he would be running himself into the ground.

Besides, he knew he'd needed the distraction. Otherwise he would have been forced to think and remember every moment leading up to Sasuke's return – and that would have really worn him out. So Naruto had stuck with that regimen until he couldn't possibly avoid the issue any more on the day Team 7 was finally reunited.

Now, being here in a completely different place with no Ichiraku's to run to or forest to safely train in, Naruto couldn't avoid anything. What's more, Sasuke was the only companion he had here from the world he knew. So no matter how much he tried to fight it, Naruto's mind would always rebelliously wander to Sasuke-related memories and Sasuke-related emotions. All of which were uncomfortable, to say the least.

Naruto's stomach growled loudly into the silence of the room and Naruto pulled himself from his thoughts. He looked back at his reflection, now marred by a serious frown that made him look at least ten years older, as he put the forehead protector over his bangs and tied it from behind.

He had wanted to go out to the grounds and do some training now that he had his old clothes, but eating would probably have to be his first priority. He grimaced at the thought that there would certainly not be any ramen waiting for him as he made his way out of the room, hoping that the Great Hall was open.

…………………………………………………………………….

The late morning air nipped at his perspiring skin as Sasuke moved through the motions of a familiar and yet difficult kata he had devised while at Orochimaru's. His breath was already coming in small controlled gasps, sending puffs of mist into the cold air, as he punched, leapt, kicked, and dodged in alternately circular and jabbing motions.

The weather conditions made training different. Puffy, gray clouds floated across the sky, their shadows sliding across the rolling grounds and the calm lake. A stiff breeze blew by every once and a while, ruffling his hair and open shirt and howling through the trees at the edge of the forest. The top tiers of the castle were engulfed in some low passing clouds and the overall effect was to make the building on the jutting cliff look that much more imposing – like it could touch the sky.

He was used to the weather conditions in the shinobi nations which were generally warmer, even in the winter. That was, except for parts of the water country – which could very well be iced over during all seasons of the year.

This weather was different from all of that, however. It was cloudy and cold, but not too cold, and the sun still managed to find its way through the clouds and provide just the barest hint of golden light upon the grounds. The air was also never still.

He blew a wayward piece of his bangs out of his eyes distractedly as he went into a bicycle flip. Sasuke landed upon the soft, saturated grass with the barest of pressure, before he kicked off into another flip which ended with a round house kick that sliced through the air. As he stood up, he could feel eyes on him as some students exited the glass-paned buildings called green houses and watched him, but he ignored them otherwise. He was only waiting for one particular sensation to rouse his attention, but so far, that familiar chakra signature remained inactive.

Much against his better judgement, Sasuke looked up at one of the top-most towers where he knew Naruto was still sleeping. He vaguely noticed the students who had been watching him as they slowly trudged into the castle, their black robes whipping around their legs in the stiff breeze.

It was odd for Naruto to be asleep at such a late hour. Sasuke knew Naruto well enough to find this behavior disconcerting. At least, he had known Naruto well enough before. Now…

Sasuke shook his head, whipping his untamed black hair out of his face as he did so. It was hard to admit, but Naruto was certainly different now – and it secretly pained Sasuke to realize that maybe he didn't know Naruto as well as he thought he had before.

Not that he thought he'd care either way at the time he'd left Konoha. No, at that point he was willing to give up his very life to take the life of another. That had been the plan and he had been dead set on following through, because nothing else had mattered.

Or at least he'd thought that had been the case.

But something had mattered and that had become quite problematic. No matter how much he had tried to stay impervious to it and had tried to deny it outright, someone had mattered to him more than his own life and even more than the death of his hated brother. Someone had already weedled below his hatred for everything and taken up residence deep within him – where nothing could possibly touch it, but he could always still feel it just below his sternum; the deep ache that had nothing to do with the ghosts of his past or the vengeance of his future.

It had frustrated him as he trained under Orochimaru – always reminding him of something he had just wanted to forget; always distracting him from his final purpose. It was the force that had tied him to a place he'd wanted to abandon until it meant nothing more than a mere name on the tip of his tongue; a mere set of syllables stuck randomly together.

And he'd only realized what it had truly meant after he'd almost lost _him_ – when he just couldn't deny it any more. But Naruto had not reacted well to the results of Sasuke's own inner discovery. That force within Sasuke had snapped in those strange moments and suddenly he couldn't grasp upon any form of control. As painful as it all was, it was the moment Sasuke had finally realized where his very spirit had gone, because it had left him the moment Naruto seemed to have given up.

After all, what did he have after Itachi was dead? He thought he would die as well, possibly from the wounds of the battle or from his own hand. Staying alive he would have nothing but darkness and the emptiness of his own lifeless thoughts.

He had told himself that all along, but that wasn't really the case. Not when it really mattered. Something was always pulling him back into the bright, warm, sunlight. It took Naruto to show him that, in the end, he was more than willing to step out into the light and squint against its unfamiliar brightness; to feel again.

But after Sasuke's strange awakening, Naruto had remained silent and aloof – avoiding him for the entire month. Rejected, Sasuke had escaped back into himself – strangely unsure of himself around the boy he now knew was more than his most precious friend.

Sasuke closed his eyes as the breeze ruffled his hair and blew past his ear drums.

After all of this. After the transformation within him that made him feel like a completely different person, he felt slightly stranded. He felt as though he had escaped the darkness of night after many years, only to be shunned into the shadows. Sasuke's lips turned down into a frown which marred his otherwise blank expression. How very melodramatic. To think that he would turn out this way. His old self would have probably sneered at him and called him weak. That part of him was still there in the back of his mind, chastising him for forgetting his all-powerful hatred.

Sasuke's expression hardened as he calmly told that part of his mind to go fuck itself. After all, he hadn't changed _that _much. He certainly hadn't become weak and he certainly hadn't lost his ability to ignore annoying people or annoying voices in his head, for that matter.

Something tingled at the back of his mind and he felt Naruto's chakra signature spike considerably from the top of the tower. He was awake.

Sasuke let out a breath and then started another kata. He would follow Naruto through out the day by chakra signature alone, since he couldn't very well follow the stubborn fox-boy around in person. Luckily for him, the idiot never mastered the ability to mask his considerably large chakra signature and thus his movements and actions were like an open book.

Once again, some stragglers stopped and stared as Sasuke continued to train, completely oblivious to all except one who wasn't even aware of Sasuke's current activities at all.

………………………………………………………………..

In all the excitement of the first days of term, given the two new arrivals in the form of ninja from an unknown land, Harry had completely forgotten about his suspicions regarding Malfoy.

Now that he, Ron, and Hermione were at lunch and very little students had made it into the Great Hall to start eating, however, he decided it was best to tell them what he had witnessed back on the train.

He told them both about the incident in the train and how blood came to be pasted all over the lower half of his face and into his shirt.

"Oh yeah, I saw Malfoy miming something to do with a nose after you entered the Great Hall that night," Ron said darkly after Harry had begun.

"Yeah, well, never mind that," said Harry bitterly. "Listen to what he was saying before he found out I was there…"

Harry had expected Ron and Hermione to be stunned by Malfoy's boasts. With what Harry considered pure pigheadedness, however, Ron and Hermione looked unimpressed.

"Come on, Harry, he was just showing off for Parkinson…What kind of mission would You-Know-Who have given him?"

"How d'you know Voldemort doesn't need someone at Hogwarts? It wouldn't be the first – "

Both Ron and Hermione shivered at the name, but they didn't comment. They knew how much their fear of it irritated Harry.

"What d'you think Hermione?" asked Harry, hoping she would back him up.

"Well," she said uncertainly, "I don't know…It would be like Malfoy to make himself seem more important than he is…but that's a big lie to tell…"

"Exactly," said Harry, but he could not press the point, because now the Great Hall was filling and so many people were trying to listen in to his conversation, not to mention staring at him and whispering behind their hands.

"It's rude to point," Ron snapped at a particularly minuscule first-year boy as he, Harry, and Hermione all got up to leave the Great Hall. The boy, who had been muttering something about Harry behind his hand to his friend, promptly turned scarlet and toppled off of his seat in alarm. Ron sniggered.

"I love being a sixth year. _And _we'll had loads of free time this year. Whole periods when we can just sit up in the common room and relax."

"We're going to need that time for studying, Ron!" said Hermione, as they walked out of the doors to the Great Hall.

"Yeah, but not today," said Ron. "Today's going to be a real doss, I reckon."

"Backs to the wall, Crabb and Goyle. Looks like the fishcake is coming, or should I say _fruit_cake?"

The sound of sniggering filled the entrance hall and Harry looked left to see Malfoy with his cronies, Crabbe and Goyle, smirking in malicious amusement at someone coming down the staircase.

Naruto had only just stepped down onto ground level, frowning at the smirking Malfoy, before Harry pulled out his wand and pointed it straight at Malfoy's chest.

"Shut it, Malfoy!"

"Oh, Potter, I didn't notice you there," Malfoy said with the ghost of a smirk. "Having fun with your back-scuttler ninja friends?"

"Having fun working for Voldemort?" Harry shot back, ignoring the way Hermione clapped a hand to her face in exasperation and Ron muttered something under his breath.

Malfoy's smirk dropped entirely. "That's a dangerous accusation to make, Potter."

"Not if it's true." Harry growled, raising his wand.

"Maybe you should be more worried about hanging out with queers like this one." Malfoy smirked again as he cocked his head toward Naruto. "Wouldn't want the _Chosen One _to fall victim to more bad rumors."

"What d'you mean, Malfoy?" asked Ron, taking a step toward Malfoy to stand beside Harry.

"Only that Potter here has been spending an awful lot of time with flamboyant homosexuals," Malfoy's smirk widened as Goyle and Crabbe snickered behind him. "Could reflect badly on him."

Hermione let out a breath as though highly offended, but that wasn't what grabbed Harry's attention.

Suddenly, the entire room was filled with a bright blue light, emanating from strange blue flames that now engulfed Naruto's form as he stood unnaturally tense.

Naruto's eyes were cold as he glared at Malfoy, but the most disconcerting thing was the way the room suddenly felt imposingly tight – as though a great force was pushing against Harry's body. Ron and Hermione had already stepped back – Ron's mouth open and his eyes wide as he stared at the teen who for all intents and purposes looked like he had burst into flames.

People from the Great Hall noticed the strange light and collected by the doors, crowding to see what caused it.

"What did you call me?"

Naruto's voice came out calmly but the flames around his body lashed out and turned purple, under-toning a deep and dangerous power that had been completely hidden before.

Malfoy was completely taken aback and he stepped backward into Crabbe who fell onto the ground in his own bumbling haste to run away. More and more students were watching now. Pointing at the strange sight of Naruto aflame and Harry with his wand still vaguely pointing in Malfoy's general direction.

Malfoy looked around, clearly noticing all the witnesses and feeling the pressure to not act the coward. Surprisingly, he stepped forward and attempted an uncertain sneer at Naruto. He pulled out his wand and pointed it back at Naruto's simmering form.

"I-I called you an arse-bandit. You know, a fag, fairy, fudge packer, poncey, poof…" Malfoy listed the labels and seemed to gain courage with each syllable. Harry found Malfoy's decision to stand up to Naruto one of his dimmer ones as the pressure in the room doubled, but Malfoy went treacherously on. However, all the while his shaking wand gave his anxiety away. "Bender, brown-hatter, buftie, gaylord, homo – "

"You…!" Naruto's fists clenched and he growled deeply. The sound uncannily rumbled throughout the room and across the walls. It had a disturbing effect.

Malfoy smirked and cocked his wand, before pulling it back in clear preparation for a hex. "Stupify!"

"Expelliarmus!" Harry yelled on reflex, but Malfoy dodged the attack.

A jet of bright red light was sent straight at Naruto and he dodged it just barely, the spell singing his hair and hitting the staircase behind him. Naruto's power became even more evident in the flames that surrounded him in a swirling purple mass as he glanced back at the smoking hole that now marred the stone steps.

Without any preamble, he ran straight at Malfoy, his fist in the air.

"Ack!"

The crowd gasped as Malfoy was suddenly pulled back against the body of a much taller black-haired teen, the long blade of his sword against Malfoy's tender neck. Harry hadn't even seen Sasuke enter the room.

Even Naruto seemed to have been surprised by this turn of events because the flames around his body immediately died down and he stopped charging abruptly, yelling out in alarm, "Sasuke!"

But Sasuke ignored him and everyone else, for that matter, as his deep black eyes seemed to burn into the top of Malfoy's quivering head.

"You should stop struggling." Sasuke's deep voice was unnervingly monotone, emotionless. "You wouldn't want this blade to peirce your flesh unnecessarily."

Malfoy let out a very unbecoming eep and went completely still. Harry never thought he'd think this, but he suddenly felt very sorry for Malfoy as the dark ninja held him in a death lock.

The entire room and some of the Great Hall was watching the scene was baited breath and Hermione had practically stopped breathing altogether.

Out of the corner of his eye, Harry noticed Naruto make some strange gestures with his hands as the blond watched the scene with a scowl.

Sasuke merely grabbed hold of Malfoy's stiffly outstretched arm and pulled the wand out of Malfoy's grip. Sasuke looked at it for a moment before he threw he away so that it landed just outside the door to the entrance hall.

"Now, what did you call Naruto and I?" Sasuke's voice now contained a dull edge to it, but his stoic manner had not changed.

Harry could see Malfoy's adam's apple bob up and down beneath the sword's edge as Sasuke pressed it closer into the skin.

"Stop it, bastard," Naruto growled, his teeth slightly longer than Harry remembered. "That's enough."

But Sasuke didn't even acknowledge he had heard Naruto as Malfoy began to squirm again from discomfort. Suddenly, Malfoy was gasping for breath as the flat edge of the blade put pressure on his throat and choked him.

Harry actually began to feel anxious as Malfoy choked and spluttered, and people in the crowd began to murmur worriedly. Harry raised his wand again, recognizing that this was a strange day for him to try to defend Malfoy, but he had always felt wary of Sasuke who was a relative stranger and he wouldn't put anything past him.

Harry was just about to step forward and protest Sasuke's actions when there was a sudden flurry of movement and Sasuke was pushed to the wall by an angry Naruto. What made this strange was the fact that Naruto was now clearly in two places at once.

"The bloody hell – ?" Ron muttered beside Harry, clearly in a state of shock that Naruto could perform such an advanced state of magic.

Harry stared, as did everyone else, as the Naruto beside him stepped forward and pulled a shaking Malfoy out of Sasuke slackening grip – Sasuke's sword, along with his arm, was already pushed against the wall by the other Naruto.

The Naruto pushing him against the wall spoke first as his hands gripped Sasuke's sword arm more securely. "Bastard, what the hell do you think you were doing?"

"Keeping you from doing something stupid."

"What?" Naruto growled, glancing over at Malfoy for a second who looked like he was about to wet himself. "So you could do something stupid, instead? And I guess you think it's smart to nearly cut his neck off when he couldn't even fight back?"

Sasuke looked away as if he was bored with the entire ordeal, but he also looked a bit irritated. "Hn. Like I'd kill him."

Harry didn't know whether to believe that statement or not.

Malfoy staggered away over to the staircase in a daze that would have been funny if the situation hadn't seemed so dire only moments before.

Sasuke pushed away from the wall wordlessly, before the Naruto holding him down popped out of existence in a cloud of white smoke. The entire crowd gasped, but Naruto and Sasuke both seemed completely unfazed.

Sasuke stared at Naruto wordlessly for a bit, before he stepped back outside where it was now pouring rain. Naruto just watched him until he was out of sight.

Harry could just barely hear the angry mutter escaping Naruto's lips.

"Asshole. It's all your fault anyway."

Suddenly, the crowd now filling one of the corridors broke apart and Professor McGonagal came stomping through. "What _is _the meaning of this ruckus?"

Harry thought that McGonagal had arrived a bit late, but he realized that the entire confrontation must have only lasted a few minutes.

Malfoy had already stepped over to her and opened his mouth, holding his neck with an over-acted expression of pain.

Harry already knew Naruto, Sasuke and Harry himself were going to be in an inordinate amount of trouble.

Malfoy began his account to Professor McGonagal and no one even noticed the way Sasuke's blank expression gave way to something else entirely as he walked out into the rain.

………………………………………………………………………..

AN: um…hello…this was very late and uber hard to write. I hope it still came out fine. /head thunk desk/.

Please disregard any inconsistancies you may see with characterization, because chances are it has to do with the past plot that has not been revealed yet. If not, well then, I'm uber sorry.

Thank you all for reading and I hope you enjoyed this instalment despite my own criticism…

TBC…


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